Poly vs Replit for building with AI together

Replit and Poly both let a team build software with AI in a browser, and they make opposite bets about what the team shares. Replit shares the project: each teammate opens their own thread with Replit Agent, tasks run in isolated copies, and a person applies each finished task to the main version. Poly (usepoly.co) shares the session: one AI, one timeline, and every member can prompt it, approve its changes and undo its turns. Replit is the more complete platform, with an editor, a database, hosting and deployments built in. Poly is the narrower tool built for a small group steering one build together, including people who don't code.

How Replit works with a team

On Replit, a team shares a project and each builder works with Replit Agent in their own thread. A request becomes a task that runs in an isolated copy of the project, and tasks move across a board with Drafts, Active, Ready and Done columns. When a task is Ready, a person reviews it and clicks "Apply changes to main version", and Agent resolves conflicts with other work. Collaborators can see the project's chat history and memories.

Replit Agent also has a Plan mode, which writes a task list you approve before building starts, and it asks before any paid action. It saves checkpoints as it goes. Each checkpoint captures the files, packages, configuration, chat context and the development database, and rolling back is one click; the production database has its own point-in-time restore.

On the Core and Pro plans, builders can choose the model in Power or Max mode, from Claude, GPT and Kimi models, and set the effort from Low to Max. The free tier routes requests automatically. Replit's docs say the model picker is still rolling out and varies by account.

Recent additions, from Replit's changelog:

• Monitoring Agent (October 23), which watches a published app and fixes production issues, with an experimental setting to republish on its own.
• Read-only sharing of chats and assets (October 23).
• Replit Desktop for Windows, in private preview, which builds apps locally in a sandbox (October 9).
• Bring Your Own Cloud for Enterprise (October 16).

How Poly works with a team

A Poly room holds one AI session that everyone shares. Anyone in the room types a prompt, prompts queue in order, and the whole room watches the AI work in one timeline. How often the AI stops to ask is the room's trust level: "Show a plan first", "Ask before big steps", "Ask about everything" or "Just build", which is where new rooms start. At the levels that ask, the proposed change is a card on every member's screen, in plain language, and any member can approve or decline it.

Each turn ends with a receipt naming who sent the prompt, which model ran it, how long it took and what it cost. A turn that changed files gets a diff and an Undo button. Members see the running app as a live preview, and the room's owner can publish a static copy at a public address. Group chat and polls sit beside the timeline, and the AI never reads them.

Where Replit is stronger

• It is a whole platform. An editor, a shell, a database, hosting, custom domains, deployments and mobile apps through Expo, in one place. A Poly room builds and previews; publishing gives a static snapshot, and an app with a backend can be previewed but not yet published.
• Parallel work. Pro runs up to ten agent tasks at once for up to fifteen builders, each in its own copy. A Poly room's shared agent runs one turn at a time, on purpose.
• Rollback that includes the database. Replit's checkpoints restore the development database along with the code; Pro keeps database rollback for 28 days. Poly's Undo puts a turn's files back.
• Maturity and compliance. Years of multiplayer editing, SOC 2 Type II, viewer seats for stakeholders, and credits for funded startups.

Where Poly is stronger

• One session. Everyone sees the same prompt, the same reply and the same change as it happens, and the person who typed the prompt isn't a bottleneck: any member can answer the AI's question or approve its edit.
• A say before it lands. In Replit, you approve a plan up front and review a finished task at the end. In Poly, at the levels that ask, each proposed change is a card before it happens, and the timeline records who decided.
• Receipts. Every turn names who ran it, which model, how long it took and what it cost in credits, charged to that person. On Replit Pro, credits pool from the admin's account.
• The non-coder drives. On Replit, someone who isn't building gets a read-only viewer seat or a builder seat of their own. In Poly, the person who can't code prompts, approves and undoes like anyone else, and watching, chatting and approving are free.
• Four labs, free models included. Each member picks Claude, GPT, Grok or Muse for their own turns in the same room, and every lab has a free model. More in multi-model AI coding.
• A channel the AI cannot read. Poly's group chat and polls are hidden from the agent, so the argument about the plan stays out of the prompt.

Pricing, side by side

Replit Core is $20 a month, or $18 billed yearly, for up to five collaborators and one background task at a time. Pro is $100 a month for up to fifteen builders, ten parallel tasks and fifty viewers, with pooled credits that roll over for two months. Replit's full price list is in Replit pricing.

Poly is free to start with no card. A person who runs the AI pays $20 a month for Pro or $50 for Max, and everyone else watches, chats and approves for free. A team of five where two people run the AI pays Poly $40 a month, and Replit $20 or $100 depending on how many parallel tasks they need.

Which should you pick?

• You want to ship a product with hosting, a database and deploys from one tool: Replit.
• Several engineers want to run many agent tasks in parallel: Replit Pro.
• A small group, including someone who doesn't code, wants to steer one AI together and see each change before it lands: Poly.
• You already have a repository and a deploy pipeline and want the AI's work visible and attributable: Poly, connected to the repository; the room's work goes to a pull request when someone sends it.

They also combine: a Poly room can work on a repository that a Replit project also uses, and the code meets in git. For other options, see Replit alternatives for cofounders, Replit vs Lovable and Poly vs Lovable.