Everyone seems to be building AI products right now.
Open LinkedIn, Product Hunt, or Twitter, and you'll find hundreds of new AI tools launching every week. Most of them are built on top of existing AI models and compete in an increasingly crowded market.
When I started looking for my next side project, I asked myself a simple question:
Should I build another AI app, or should I solve a real problem that developers face every day?
I chose the second option.
That's how Online JSON Tools was born.
As a backend developer, I work with JSON constantly. API requests, API responses, configuration files, third-party integrations, log files, and microservices all rely heavily on JSON. On some days, I spend more time reading JSON than writing actual business logic.
Despite that, many online JSON tools felt outdated, cluttered, or incomplete.
Some had intrusive ads everywhere.
Some had poor dark mode support.
Some simply showed "Invalid JSON" without explaining what was actually wrong.
Others struggled with larger files or provided a poor editing experience.
I wanted something better.
So instead of building another AI wrapper, I decided to build a tool that developers could genuinely use every day.
The Goal
The goal was simple:
Create a fast, developer-focused JSON utility platform that prioritizes usability, performance, and clarity.
No unnecessary features.
No complicated setup.
No server dependency for basic operations.
Just a tool that helps developers work with JSON faster.
What the Tool Does
Currently, Online JSON Tools focuses on the most common JSON workflows:
Beautifying JSON
Minifying JSON
Validating JSON
Identifying syntax errors
Showing line and column information
Copying formatted output
Down processed JSON
Supporting dark mode for long development sessions
Everything happens directly in the browser.
Your JSON never needs to leave your machine for basic formatting and validation tasks.
One Problem I Wanted to Fix
Most validators stop at:
Invalid JSON
That message is technically correct.
But it doesn't help much.
Imagine opening a 500-line JSON document and being told only that it's invalid.
Now you have to search through the entire file trying to locate the issue yourself.
Instead, I wanted the validator to provide useful feedback:
Which line contains the error
Which column contains the error
What caused the problem
A suggested fix
Something as simple as a trailing comma can waste several minutes when you're dealing with large payloads.
Good tooling should reduce that friction.
Why Not Build an AI Product?
This was probably the biggest decision.
AI products are attractive because they are trending.
But trends change quickly.
Utility tools solve recurring problems.
Developers were formatting JSON ten years ago.
Developers are formatting JSON today.
Developers will probably still be formatting JSON ten years from now.
That makes the problem far more stable than chasing whatever technology trend happens to be popular this month.
I wanted to build something with long-term value rather than short-term hype.
Technical Decisions
I kept the initial architecture intentionally simple.
The platform is built using:
Next.js
TypeScript
Tailwind CSS
Monaco Editor
The first version is frontend-only.
That decision offers several advantages:
Faster deployment
Lower hosting costs
Better performance
Easier maintenance
No backend infrastructure
Since formatting and validation can happen entirely in the browser, there was no reason to introduce unnecessary complexity.
Sometimes the best architecture is the simplest one that solves the problem effectively.
Challenges During Development
What looked like a simple weekend project quickly became more complicated.
A JSON formatter sounds easy.
Paste JSON.
Call JSON.parse(). Display the result.
Done.
Reality was different.
I spent significant time improving the editing experience, handling validation errors properly, refining the interface, and making sure the tool behaved the way developers expect.
One of the most interesting challenges was making validation feedback useful instead of generic.
Another was ensuring the editor experience felt smooth and professional.
The goal wasn't just functionality.
The goal was usability.
What I Learned
Building developer tools taught me something important:
You don't need a revolutionary idea to create a useful product.
You don't need AI.
You don't need blockchain.
You don't need a complex SaaS platform.
Sometimes solving a small, annoying problem well is enough.
Developers appreciate tools that save time.
Even if that time savings is only a few minutes per day.
Those minutes add up.
What's Next?
Online JSON Tools is still growing.
Future improvements include:
JSON Diff Tool
JSON Tree Viewer
JSON Repair
JSON Escape and Unescape
Additional developer utilities
The vision is to create a practical toolkit that developers can rely on whenever they need to inspect, validate, transform, or analyze JSON.
Final Thoughts Building another AI application would have been the obvious choice.
Building a JSON utility platform was the less exciting option.
But it was also the more practical one.
I developed Online JSON Tools because I wanted a faster and more developer-friendly way to work with JSON. Sometimes the best projects aren't the ones that follow the latest trend. They're the ones that solve a problem people already have.
If you're a developer, what JSON-related task do you find yourself doing most often?