Extreme Native Perf on the Web with Superhuman

In this conversation, hosts Wes Bos and Scott Tolinski sit down with Loïc Houssier, Head of Engineering at Superhuman, to explore the tech and philosophy behind building a lightning-fast web-based email client. They discuss how Superhuman achieves a 100 ms interaction target through a local-first architecture—using Realm for offline storage and a custom sync engine—combined with native-like performance and AI-powered productivity features. The episode dives into decisions around privacy, vector search, calendar integrations, and the balance of speed vs. cost in engineering.

The dialogue also touches on team dynamics, release strategies, command palettes and keyboard shortcuts, handling major outages (like Google and Cloudflare), and future-forward ideas like a true dark mode. Throughout the episode, the focus remains on creating delightful, high-speed experiences and reimagining email workflows for the future