Technical Debt in MVPs: When to Care and When to Ship

Technical debt gets a bad rap. But in the MVP stage, some debt is not just acceptable—it's strategic.

Good Debt vs. Bad Debt

**Good debt** speeds you up today without blocking you tomorrow:

Hardcoded values you can change later

Manual processes you can automate later

Simple architecture you can scale later

**Bad debt** creates compounding problems:

No tests for critical paths

Security shortcuts

Unclear data models

No error handling

If it would take 10x longer to do it "right," do it fast and ship. You can always refactor. You can't get back time spent on code that never ships.

1. **Authentication security** - Use proven libraries, never roll your own

2. **Data backups** - Set up from day 1

3. **Error tracking** - Use Sentry or similar

4. **Basic monitoring** - Know when your app is down

You have about 3-6 months after launch before debt becomes painful. Use this time to:

Watch what users actually use

Identify what needs to scale

Pay down debt strategically