Build your own Wave with Claude Code

Free invoicing and accounting for small businesses: invoices, receipts, bank import and more.

WeekendA working first version in a day or two

The Claude Code prompt

Build my own take on Wave: free invoicing and accounting for small businesses. Give it an original name, logo, colours and copy, and do not use Wave's name, branding or assets.

Version one should have:
- Invoices
- Receipts
- Bank import
- Income and expense reports
- Payments

The hard part: Small. Build invoices and reports well.

How to build it:
1. Read this folder first. If it is empty, set up Next.js (App Router, TypeScript, Tailwind) with Postgres through Prisma or Supabase, and Supabase Auth or Auth.js for sign-in. Write a short PLAN.md with the data model, screens, third-party services and what you are leaving out of version one.
2. Build the core loop end to end before anything else: invoices, working with real data saved to the database.
3. Add the rest of the features one at a time, and seed realistic demo data so every screen looks alive.
4. Keep API keys in environment variables, and put any paid service behind a small interface with a local stub, so the app runs on a fresh machine without accounts.
5. Run it, click through every screen on desktop and mobile widths, fix what breaks, and finish with a summary of what works, what is stubbed and how to deploy it.

Paste it into Claude Code in an empty folder. It plans first, so read PLAN.md and steer before it starts building.

Version one

  • Invoices
  • Receipts
  • Bank import
  • Income and expense reports
  • Payments

The hard part

Small. Build invoices and reports well.

Make it yours: a niche Wave ignores, an original name and brand, and one feature it does badly done well.

More to build

More in Money & finance · Every build idea