How I Built a Complete SaaS in 48 Hours Using Craft CLI

The Challenge

I wanted to build a simple SaaS product to validate a business idea quickly. The product needed user authentication, subscription billing, a dashboard, and email notifications. Normally, this would take weeks to set up properly.

With Craft's CLI and AI skills, I managed to ship a production-ready MVP in just 48 hours. Here's exactly how I did it.

Step 1: Install CLI and Choose Template (5 minutes)

First, I installed the Craft CLI globally and activated my license:

npm install -g @getcraft-dev/craft-cli
craft login YOUR_LICENSE_KEY

The CLI validated my license and showed I had access to all three quality levels (Rapid, Balanced, Crafted) and the full AI skills library.

For a 48-hour sprint solo, I chose the Rapid template. This template is optimized for speed and includes:

• Next.js 15 with App Router and React 19
• tRPC for type-safe APIs
• Supabase for database and auth
• Stripe for payments
• Resend for transactional emails
• Full testing setup with Vitest and Playwright

craft new my-saas-app
# Selected: Rapid - Web Only
# Enabled AI System: Yes

The CLI downloaded the template and automatically configured 10 MCP servers + 16 AI skills. The project was ready in under 2 minutes.

Step 2: Environment Setup (30 minutes)

I created accounts on the required services and added my API keys to .env.local:

• Supabase: Database URL and anon key
• Stripe: Secret key and webhook secret
• Resend: API key for emails

Then I initialized the database schema and started the dev server:

cd my-saas-app
pnpm install
pnpm --filter @crafted/database db:generate
pnpm dev

The boilerplate already included working auth flows, so I could immediately sign up and log in.

Step 3: Building Core Features with AI (Day 1 - ~6 hours)

This is where Craft's AI skills became incredibly powerful. I opened Claude Code and started describing features in plain English.

Feature 1: User Profile Management

I simply said: "Add a user profile page where users can update their name, email, and avatar."

The AI detected my quality level (Rapid) and generated:

• A tRPC router with update methods
• Zod validation schemas
• A Next.js page component with a form
• Integration with Supabase Auth
• Basic unit tests

Total time: 15 minutes (including testing).

Feature 2: Subscription Billing

I asked: "Add a subscription system with monthly and yearly plans using Stripe."

The AI generated:

• Stripe checkout integration
• Webhook handlers for payment events
• Subscription status in the database
• Customer portal link
• Payment confirmation emails

I just needed to create the plans in Stripe Dashboard and add the price IDs to my environment variables.

Total time: 45 minutes.

Feature 3: Admin Dashboard

For the admin interface, I requested: "Create an admin dashboard showing all users, their subscription status, and total revenue."

The AI built:

• Admin-only tRPC routes with role-based access
• Dashboard page with data tables
• Revenue calculations and stats
• Filter and search functionality

Total time: 30 minutes.

Step 4: Testing and Bug Fixes (~3 hours)

I ran the test suite and fixed a few edge cases. The AI had already generated most unit tests, so I focused on:

• E2E tests for critical flows (signup, checkout)
• Manual testing of the UI
• Fixing responsive design issues

pnpm test              # All unit tests passed
pnpm test:e2e          # E2E tests passed

Step 5: Polish and Deploy (Day 2 - ~6 hours)

On the second day, I focused on polish:

• Customized email templates
• Added a landing page
• Set up analytics (PostHog)
• Deployed to Vercel

Deployment was straightforward. I connected my GitHub repo to Vercel, added the environment variables, and pushed:

git add .
git commit -m "Initial MVP"
git push origin main

Vercel automatically built and deployed the app. The production build succeeded on the first try.

What I Shipped in 48 Hours

• ✅ Complete authentication system (email/password + social auth)
• ✅ User profiles with avatar uploads
• ✅ Stripe subscription billing (monthly/yearly)
• ✅ Customer portal for managing subscriptions
• ✅ Admin dashboard with user management
• ✅ Transactional emails (welcome, payment confirmations)
• ✅ Responsive UI with Tailwind CSS
• ✅ Full test coverage (unit + E2E)
• ✅ Production deployment on Vercel

Key Takeaways

1. The boilerplate saves massive time. Authentication, database setup, payment integration - all of this "just worked" out of the box.
2. AI skills are incredibly productive. Describing features in plain English and getting production-ready code in minutes felt like magic.
3. Choose the right quality level. For a quick MVP, Rapid was perfect. For a long-term product, I'd upgrade to Balanced or Crafted later.
4. Testing is built-in. Having tests generated alongside features gave me confidence to ship quickly.

Would I Do It Again?

Absolutely. I've already built two more projects with Craft, and each time I'm shipping faster as I learn the workflow.

If you're validating a SaaS idea or need to ship an MVP quickly, Craft is the fastest way I've found to go from idea to production.