Most people hit a wall with Claude Code not because they’re doing something wrong, but because they have no map for what progress looks like. Six levels separate the beginners from the orchestrators — here’s how to find yourself on that map.

Level 1 — The prompt engineer

This used to be a job title. Now it’s table stakes.

You treat Claude like a vending machine: input a command, collect the output. The result is AI slop — every website the same purple gradient, same icons, same forgettable fonts. That’s what happens when you leave the gaps for Claude to fill. It fills them with average.