Inspect, Develop and Run Web Applications & Node backend in your browser with StackBlitz

Lucas Jellema
3 min readAug 26, 2023

If I had not seen it, I doubt I would have believed it. If you click this link you will open a StackBlitz workspace right in your browser. You will have VS Code with all sources that make up a web application (Vue 3 in this case) as well as its backend (Node). The application is running and you can see it in the same or a separate window.

StackBlitz running VS Code, Node and a live preview of my Vue Application; click the link and you will the same thing in your browser

You can further develop the application. Install new npm modules, finetune the build configuration, change the code. Through Hot Module Reload, changes are immediately reflected in the live running application.

You can save your changes, download the project, share your environment (definition), open anyone else’s web application from a single URL. Without installing anything.

StackBlitz runs on WebContainers — built in Web Assembly, a binary language supported by most major browsers. StackBlitz runs entirely inside your browser. You knew already that your browser is an incredibly powerful platform, an application server and virtual desktop combined. I would say that with StackBlitz your understanding of just how powerful is stretched a little further.

Through StackBlitz, any tutorial, workshop, blogarticle or StackTrace entry can be accompanied by a full fledged code example that can…

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Lucas Jellema

Lucas Jellema is CTO and IT architect at Conclusion, The Netherlands. He is Oracle ACE Director, one time JavaOne Rockstar and programmer