DEV Community

frankchen-sketch
frankchen-sketch

Posted on Edited on

I built a free I Ching divination web app with AI readings (build log)

A few months ago I got interested in the I Ching (Book of Changes) — not the fortune-telling caricature, but the actual 3,000-year-old divination system with 64 hexagrams and surprisingly coherent philosophy.

The problem: most online I Ching tools are either ad-ridden, require signups, or just show you the raw hexagram text with zero interpretation. So I built The Hexagrams — a free, no-signup I Ching app.

What it does:

  • Write a question, shake the coin cup (animated, three coins, six lines) — the old-school yarrow/coin method, digitized
  • Get the hexagram with proper trigram structure, changing lines, and the classical text
  • An AI reading connects the classical interpretation to your actual question instead of leaving you with cryptic hexagram names

Stack notes for the technically curious:

  • Static-first Astro site (fast, works on flaky connections)
  • Coin toss is cryptographically random, not Math.random
  • All 64 hexagrams ship as structured data — the AI layer only augments the classical text, never replaces it

Design-wise I went for a calm ink-and-paper feel rather than the usual dark-mode-SaaS look. Feedback welcome — especially from anyone who knows the I Ching tradition well and has opinions about how digital divination should (or shouldn't) work.

The site is free, no account needed.

Top comments (0)