TL;DR: I stopped collecting AI tools and started chaining them: Comet for verified research, ChatGPT to turn it into plain English, Copilot for everyday code, Claude Code as reviewer and architecture partner, Supabase and Vercel to ship, plus Notion, Excalidraw, Visily, and a couple of screen-recording tools around the edges. Productivity came from connecting tools, not adding more of them.
AI tools are everywhere. Every week, a new one appears, promising to make you faster, smarter, or more creative.
When I first started exploring them, I fell into the same trap most developers do. I tried everything. I signed up for every beta, joined every waitlist, and bookmarked every "Top 100 AI Tools" list I could find. It felt exciting at first. Then it got exhausting. At some point, I realized I wasn't learning faster, I was just juggling more apps. So I stepped back and asked myself: do I really need more tools, or do I just need the right ones working together? That question changed how I approach AI.
The discovery: building my own stack
It started as an experiment. I wanted to see what would happen if I stopped collecting tools and started connecting them instead.
Each AI platform had its own strength. ChatGPT could explain complex ideas in plain English. Comet could verify them with live sources. Copilot could turn those ideas into code. Claude could review that code and refactor it intelligently. I didn't need to pick one. I needed them to work together.
That's when I coined the term AI Chaining, the process of linking multiple AI tools so each one contributes its unique strength to your workflow. AI Chaining isn't about automation or scripting. It's about designing a flow of thought: one AI generates, another validates; one builds, another explains; one creates, another refines. When you chain AIs together, you stop using them like separate tools and start using them like teammates.
Here's what my AI stack looks like and how each piece fits into the chain.
Research: facts meet conversation
Every project starts with research. I use Comet, Perplexity's AI browser, when I need structured, verified answers with citations. Once I have the data, I move to ChatGPT to make sense of it, translating technical information into explanations, drafts, or documentation other people can understand. In my workflow, Comet is the fact-checker and ChatGPT is the storyteller. That combination is the first link in my chain: truth and tone.
Coding: Copilot and Claude Code
Coding used to be where I hit decision fatigue the hardest. Do I trust autocomplete, or do I rewrite everything myself? Then I learned to split the workload.
GitHub Copilot is my everyday companion in VS Code. It handles the small stuff like variable names, boilerplate, and repetitive syntax, and helps me stay in flow instead of getting stuck on structure. Claude Code, on the other hand, is my reviewer. It reads entire repositories, explains logic, and helps me reason through architecture decisions. When I'm deep in a project, I'll often ask it to summarize what a specific file or module does before I start editing it. It's like having two co-developers: one focused on speed, the other on strategy.
Deployment: Vercel
Every idea deserves to go live, and Vercel is where mine do. It's fast, has a generous free tier, and is built for modern frameworks. For me, it's not just about hosting, it's about iteration: I can push code, test it in production-like previews, and share it instantly with collaborators.
Database: Supabase
For backend work, Supabase handles everything I need without slowing me down. It's open source, reliable, and deeply integrated with modern stacks, giving me Postgres power with Firebase-like simplicity. Whenever I build something new, it quietly handles authentication, storage, and real-time data without requiring me to stand up another backend. In my chain, Supabase is the anchor, the solid foundation that holds the moving parts together.
Creative and productivity tools: the edges
I also use tools that stretch beyond code. They don't touch my backend logic, but they improve how I communicate and visualize ideas.
Visily helps me mock up app layouts quickly, even without deep design experience. Notion is my second brain for notes, outlines, and research summaries. Excalidraw is my favorite for flowcharts and architecture diagrams. Screen Studio and Rapidemo help me turn working builds into clean, professional demo videos.
In production: the tools that keep the site running
Beyond development, my own website relies on a few more tools to stay fast, safe, and legible to search and AI crawlers.
For social previews, I lean on the same approach behind Vercel's OG Image Playground: generate the preview image in code rather than designing one by hand for every page. Sentry monitors for errors and performance regressions, including its AI-assisted issue triage. Vercel Speed Insights helps me track Core Web Vitals in real time. None of it is glamorous, but it's what keeps a project feeling production-ready.
The bigger picture: why AI chaining matters
AI Chaining taught me something important: productivity doesn't come from using more tools. It comes from understanding how they fit together. When you stop chasing every new release and start building your own ecosystem, you get focus back. You start thinking less about what to use and more about what to create.
AI tools are at their best when they complement each other, not compete. Once you find that balance, you realize AI isn't replacing creativity or coding, it's extending it. Each link in your chain becomes an extension of your thought process, from research to deployment to design. And suddenly, everything just flows.
Final thoughts
If you're a developer, researcher, or creator trying to keep up with the flood of new AI tools, take a step back. You don't need to master all of them. You just need to find the ones that move with you.
For me, that's Comet, ChatGPT, Copilot, Claude, Vercel, Supabase, and a handful of creative companions. Together, they form my AI chain, the system that keeps me grounded, focused, and creative. So build your own stack. Experiment. Chain your tools together until they feel like extensions of how you think. Start with one tool, see how it fits into your process, then connect it to the next. Before long you'll have a system that doesn't just work, it grows with you.
Sources
- Comet: Browse at the speed of thought, Perplexity.
- GitHub Copilot documentation, GitHub.
- Vercel documentation, Vercel.
- Supabase documentation, Supabase.
- Vercel Speed Insights, Vercel.
- Sentry, error and performance monitoring.