Thariq Shihipar from Anthropic's Claude Code team says HTML improves readability and enables direct interaction over markdown for tracking long-running AI agent outputs

Original post

continuing my HTML era, I had so much fun talking with Claire at Code w/ Claude about staying in the loop with long running agents

claire vo 🖤@clairevo

Soooo @trq212 has straight up changed my life with these 5 words:

"HTML is the new markdown."

It's so obvious in hindsight: while .md is simple to write and agents can read it well, it's a total slog to eyeball as a human.

In this special ep recorded live at Code with Claude, Thariq walks me through how he:

- uses HTML artifacts as interactive specs - builds throwaway micro-UIs - maintains a living design system in HTML - prompts Claude with "whatever is needed" to give it room to actually think

He also tells us what comes after the SWE + PM role 👀

As always, a huge TY to our amazing sponsors: 🔀 @celigoinc - Intelligent automation built for AI: https://celigo.com/howIAI 🪪 @withpersona - trusted identity verification for any use case: https://withpersona.com/lp/howiai

Watch now on YT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qrpm7E80wQ0

10:52 AM · May 18, 2026 · 102.6K Views

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Lenny Rachitsky@lennysan

HTML is the new markdown

claire vo 🖤@clairevo

Soooo @trq212 has straight up changed my life with these 5 words:

"HTML is the new markdown."

It's so obvious in hindsight: while .md is simple to write and agents can read it well, it's a total slog to eyeball as a human.

In this special ep recorded live at Code with Claude, Thariq walks me through how he:

- uses HTML artifacts as interactive specs - builds throwaway micro-UIs - maintains a living design system in HTML - prompts Claude with "whatever is needed" to give it room to actually think

He also tells us what comes after the SWE + PM role 👀

Watch now on YT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qrpm7E80wQ0

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RETWEETS15

Thariq@trq212

continuing my HTML era, I had so much fun talking with Claire at Code w/ Claude about staying in the loop with long running agents

claire vo 🖤@clairevo

Soooo @trq212 has straight up changed my life with these 5 words:

"HTML is the new markdown."

It's so obvious in hindsight: while .md is simple to write and agents can read it well, it's a total slog to eyeball as a human.

In this special ep recorded live at Code with Claude, Thariq walks me through how he:

- uses HTML artifacts as interactive specs - builds throwaway micro-UIs - maintains a living design system in HTML - prompts Claude with "whatever is needed" to give it room to actually think

He also tells us what comes after the SWE + PM role 👀

Watch now on YT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qrpm7E80wQ0

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Ashutosh Tiwari@ashutosh_270497

@trq212 seems interesting talk, will definitely explore it!

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Rugbist@rugbist_

@trq212 html for agents, markdown for u the duality hits different when uve seen both output the same thing

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cole benefield@floinkus

@trq212 i know you don't want to drop the skill but we want the skill

42d1251

Jack Guan@JackGuanXZ

@trq212 This is awesome, I also think that scanned academic PDFs can also be replaced by HTMLs, this will make college students' life much easier.

42d382

Thariq@trq212

@JackGuanXZ oh really cool use case

42d491

EB@cesc__

@trq212 So, Thariq, have you ever tried htmlship?

42d35

AIMadeSimple@makingAISimple

@lennysan There is something called as mdx. People should use it

42d14

Andrei Apanasik (🐱, 🔪,геймдев и игры)@Suvitruf

@lennysan Я за эту фразу скоро начну бить по лицу.

42d681

Hemi@TheHemi

@lennysan I create a PRD on @chatprd for every project. I then submit the PRD to Claude Code in Plan Mode. The PRD guides Claude Code more efficiently. @clairevo

42d461

Utkarsh Sengar@utsengar

@lennysan Indeed, and built something https://htmlbin.dev/p/1Wyf23j

42d411

Patrick@patrickssons

@lennysan the LLMs decided this for us. they output cleaner HTML than they output markdown, and that's the only standard that matters now.

42d85

Kay Singh 📈🐦@singhkays

@lennysan I have experienced this personally in my own work. Surprisingly, I used HTML to solve my issue before @trq212's post but didn't think it'd be the new general pattern 🙂

42d82

Ellis Lamar Music@EllisLamarMusic

@trq212 Did someone say HTML?! I'm gonna party like it's 1999!😝

42d81

Krittin Kalra@KrittinKalra

@trq212 This is the part nobody has really psychologically processed yet

When the AI handles most of the implementation work, what exactly is the developer’s relationship to the product anymore?

And what are OpenAI or Anthropic doing about it?

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Ömer Selçuk Cihan@scihan

@lennysan People spend way too much time on things that don’t matter

42d71

raunaq@raunaqbn

HTML-docs are core to my agentic workflow at Meta:

1. Create: Claude code generates review-ready HTML docs using https://html-docs.com/agents

2. Review: I review the HTML doc with my army of agents and human collaborators.

3. Iterate: Send it back to claude-code to address. If good go build!

42d64

From Laniakea@FromLaniakea

@trq212 HTML arc continues. And after initial pushback, I am warming up to it. It's great!

One worrisome aspect is randomly fetched embedded js, considering the supply chain state of things

@trq212 please update your username to "Thariq | HTML arc" :)

42d61

Tyler Nishida@TylerNishida

@trq212 do you still use markdown for things like skills or machine-readable instructions? or do you think html works better for that too?

i like markdown (for machine) and html (for me)

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