[kerkeslager]

> If you are a two man startup, burning through runway and pre-product-market fit... then spending a lot of time on tests is questionable (although the cost-benefit now with AI is changing very fast).

What's insane that people in 2026 still think tests slow you down.

It takes me maybe 40 hours (1 week) of coding to start receiving ROI from writing tests in a greenfield project, and by 80 hours I'm pretty sure I've saved more time from bugs and improved design due to TDD than I've spent writing the tests.

The ROI is even faster if I'm not the only developer on the project.

If your flagship product takes less time to develop than 40 hours, then your product is extremely vulnerable to being copied by another company, so your entire software project is a bad business idea.

So there really aren't many exceptions: either your project benefits from tests, or it's too easy a project to be a business.

So frankly, it's your comment lacking in cost/benefit analysis.