I have a geeky hobby: dynasty fantasy football. It’s a long‑running game where you build virtual teams made up of real NFL players, track performance over multiple seasons, and constantly make decisions based on partial data, rankings, and gut feeling.

Over time, this evolved into a very familiar problem, one that shows up in many business scenarios as well:
I needed one place to capture decisions, compare them against external benchmarks, and learn from historical outcomes across years.

This session takes that exact app concept and builds it three different ways, using three Microsoft app‑building approaches—each optimized for a different set of tradeoffs:

Approach 1 — App Builder in Microsoft 365 Copilot
A fast, conversational way to build lightweight apps backed by Microsoft Lists. Ideal for quick insights, personal productivity, and simple sharing, but with clear boundaries once structure and scale increase.

Approach 2 — Power Apps Vibe
An AI‑native Power Apps experience that generates the solution holistically: requirements, Dataverse data model, and a working app with generated code. Designed for more structured scenarios where scalability, relationships, and extensibility matter.

Approach 3 — Code Apps
The pro‑developer route, offering full control over UI, architecture, ALM, and extensibility on a governed platform. This approach won’t be demoed live, but will be explained architecturally to highlight where and why it becomes the right choice.

The session is demo‑heavy for App Builder and Power Apps Vibe, and architecture‑ and decision‑framework‑focused for Code Apps. Along the way, we’ll explore:
- How AI‑generated apps differ depending on the underlying platform
- The technical and governance implications of Lists vs. Dataverse
- How to explain these tradeoffs to stakeholders who “just want an app by tomorrow”

You’ll leave with a practical mental model for why these tools exist, when to use each one, and how to choose the right approach, before rebuilding the same app three times for the wrong reasons.