Artificial intelligence (AI) has not only opened doors for groundbreaking innovation and discovery—it’s proving an invaluable resource for entrepreneurs and start-ups too. At the forefront of this revolution is 38-year-old Dutch visionary Pieter Levels, who has harnessed AI-powered automation and no-code tools to build a $1 million business in just 17 days. His latest venture, fly.pieter.com, a browser-based flight simulator, was crafted in a mere three hours using cutting-edge tools like Three.js and Cursor. Now generating $87,000 per month, it’s a testament to the transformative power of AI-driven entrepreneurship. Levels, already a veteran of multiple profitable online businesses like Nomad List, Remote OK, and Rebase, continues to redefine what’s possible for solo founders in the digital age.
From Vision to Victory in Three Hours
Pieter Levels is no novice when it comes to building successful online enterprises, but his latest project pushes the boundaries of speed and ingenuity. Armed with AI tools like Three.js, a JavaScript library for 3D rendering, and Cursor, an AI-powered coding assistant, Levels created fly.pieter.com from scratch in just three hours. “I’ve never ever made a game before and just made my own flight simulator 100% with Cursor in I’d say 3 hours by just telling it what I wanted,” he shared on X. The result is a free-to-play, massively multiplayer online (MMO) flight sim featuring a beach town, cliffs, and a runway—all rendered in vanilla HTML and JavaScript.
What started as a whimsical experiment has soared to $87,000 in monthly recurring revenue (MRR), with projections to hit $100,000 soon, equating to an annualised revenue (ARR) of $1.2 million. Levels’ mastery of AI-powered automation and no-code solutions has made fly.pieter.com a shining example of rapid prototyping and scalable innovation.
A Serial Entrepreneur with a Nomadic Spirit
Levels’ triumph with fly.pieter.com is the latest milestone in a career marked by relentless creativity and independence. A self-taught developer with an MBA but no formal coding credentials, he’s built a portfolio of thriving ventures tailored to the needs of remote workers and digital nomads. His flagship projects—Nomad List, a directory for digital nomads; Remote OK, a leading remote job board; and Rebase, an immigration service for remote professionals—collectively generate millions in revenue each year.
Nomad List, launched as a simple spreadsheet shared on Twitter in 2014, now boasts $700,000 ARR, while Remote OK exceeds $2 million ARR. Together, Levels’ empire surpasses $3 million annually—all managed single-handedly with a minimalist tech stack of vanilla JavaScript, jQuery, PHP, and SQLite. His rejection of modern frameworks like React or Angular proves that simplicity and speed can outpace complexity in building scalable businesses.
The Power of AI and Community Hype
The success of fly.pieter.com wasn’t solely down to technical prowess—it was amplified by Levels’ deft use of social media and community momentum. After launching the simulator in February 2025, he shared its development on X, igniting a viral wave that caught the attention of Elon Musk. Musk’s retweet—“Wow, this is cool. AI gaming will be massive”—catapulted the project to new heights, drawing 89,000 players, with a peak of 26,000 online at once.
Seizing the moment, Levels added a $29.99 microtransaction for F-16 jets and a Mars flight feature as a nod to Musk’s SpaceX. Despite a DDOS attack with 120 million requests briefly disrupting his sites, the setback only fuelled the hype, solidifying fly.pieter.com as both a cultural phenomenon and a commercial juggernaut.
A Blueprint for the Future
Levels’ journey is more than a rags-to-riches tale; it’s a roadmap for how AI and no-code tools are levelling the playing field for entrepreneurs. By embracing AI-driven development, he’s demonstrated that you don’t need a team, venture capital, or decades of experience to create something extraordinary. “It didn’t go 100% smooth of course, but 80% yes,” he conceded on X, embodying the “vibe coding” ethos that prioritises speed and iteration over perfection.
This philosophy permeates his wider portfolio. Beyond fly.pieter.com, AI ventures like PhotoAI.com ($123,000/month) and InteriorAI.com ($35,000/month) follow the same playbook: spot a niche, leverage AI to address it, and scale with community input. It’s a formula inspiring a new wave of indie hackers and solopreneurs eager to replicate his achievements.
The Man Behind the Machine
Pieter Levels is the quintessential digital nomad he serves. After selling his belongings in 2012 to travel the world with a laptop and $1,000, he’s lived in over 40 countries and 150 cities. This nomadic lifestyle shapes his work, giving him a deep understanding of remote workers’ needs—a cornerstone of his ventures’ success.
Yet, he’s open about the challenges. “I get sick of startups after one or two years,” he confessed in Bali. “I like doing new stuff.” This restlessness fuels his constant experimentation, from failed YouTube analytics projects to his current $3 million empire. It’s a potent reminder that failure is merely a stepping stone, and persistence—paired with the right tools—can yield extraordinary results.
What’s Next for Levels?
As fly.pieter.com nears $100,000 MRR, speculation mounts about Levels’ next move. With a proven knack for turning side hustles into goldmines, he’s likely already brewing his next innovation. Whether enhancing his existing ecosystem or diving deeper into AI gaming, one thing is certain: Pieter Levels is rewriting the entrepreneurial playbook, one line of AI-generated code at a time.
For now, his advice to aspiring creators rings clear—embrace AI, act swiftly, and build from experience. In just 17 days, he’s transformed a three-hour experiment into a $1 million business. In the AI age, that’s not just a success story; it’s a clarion call for a new era of entrepreneurship.
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Quote for the Day:
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