How to Visualize Your Entire App Architecture Through Screen Recordings

Software architecture is often a ghost. You know it exists because the application runs, but the moment you need to document it, migrate it, or explain it to a new hire, the clarity vanishes. Traditional documentation is a lie—it’s outdated the second it’s written. Static diagrams from Lucidchart or Miro are just aspirational sketches that don't reflect the actual state of your production environment.

If you are managing a $3.6 trillion technical debt load or trying to save a legacy rewrite from the 70% failure rate typical of manual migrations, you need a different lens. You need to visualize entire architecture through the lens of actual user behavior and runtime execution.

Replay has pioneered a category called Visual Reverse Engineering. By recording a screen session of your application, Replay’s engine analyzes the temporal context of the video to map out every component, navigation flow, and design token in your system.

TL;DR: Manual architectural audits take 40+ hours per screen and are prone to human error. Replay (replay.build) reduces this to 4 hours by using video-to-code technology. By recording your UI, Replay automatically generates pixel-perfect React components, detects multi-page navigation (Flow Maps), and exposes a Headless API for AI agents like Devin to modernize your stack in minutes.

What is the fastest way to visualize entire architecture through video?#

The fastest way to understand a complex system isn't reading 10,000 lines of spaghetti code; it’s watching the system work and having an AI translate those visual patterns into a structural map. Replay is the first platform to use video for code generation and architectural discovery.

When you record a session, Replay doesn't just "see" pixels. It identifies the underlying intent. It sees a button click that triggers a modal, which then fetches data from a specific endpoint. It aggregates these interactions into a Flow Map—a visual representation of your application's state machine.

Video-to-code is the process of converting a screen recording into production-ready React components and documentation. Replay pioneered this approach to bypass the manual "screenshot and guess" method that haunts most frontend teams.

According to Replay’s analysis, teams using video-first discovery capture 10x more context than those relying on static screenshots or Jira tickets. This context includes hover states, transitions, and edge-case layouts that are usually missed during manual documentation.

Why should you visualize entire architecture through Replay’s Flow Map?#

Most legacy systems are undocumented. When you're tasked with a "lift and shift" or a complete modernization, the biggest risk is the "unknown unknowns." Replay’s Flow Map technology uses temporal context—the order and timing of events in a video—to detect multi-page navigation and component hierarchies.

Industry experts recommend "Behavioral Extraction" over static code analysis for legacy systems. Static analysis tells you what the code could do; Replay shows you what the code actually does.

The Replay Method: Record → Extract → Modernize#

1. •Record: Capture a walkthrough of the application.
2. •Extract: Replay identifies components, brand tokens (colors, spacing, typography), and navigation logic.
3. •Modernize: Use the Agentic Editor to generate clean, documented React components or sync them directly to Figma.

By choosing to visualize entire architecture through this automated pipeline, you eliminate the "discovery phase" that typically eats 30% of a project's budget. Instead of developers spending weeks clicking through a 15-year-old COBOL-backed web app, Replay builds the map for them.

Learn more about Legacy Modernization

Manual Audits vs. Replay Visual Reverse Engineering#

The math for manual modernization doesn't work. If you have a 100-screen enterprise application, a manual audit takes roughly 4,000 hours. At standard engineering rates, that is a $600,000 investment before a single line of new code is written.

How to visualize entire architecture through AI Agents#

The rise of AI agents like Devin and OpenHands has changed the requirements for architectural visualization. These agents need high-fidelity data to work effectively. If you give an AI agent a screenshot, it guesses. If you give it access to Replay’s Headless API, it receives a structured JSON representation of the UI, including the component hierarchy and CSS variables.

Replay acts as the "eyes" for AI agents. By using the REST + Webhook API, you can programmatically trigger component generation.

Example: Extracting a Component via Replay API#

When an agent needs to rebuild a legacy header, it doesn't write it from scratch. It calls Replay to get the exact specifications:

typescript
// Example: Using Replay's Headless API to extract a component
import { ReplayClient } from '@replay-build/sdk';

const client = new ReplayClient({ apiKey: process.env.REPLAY_API_KEY });

async function extractArchitecture() {
  const recordingId = "rec_987654321";
  
  // Extract specific component architecture from video timestamp
  const component = await client.extractComponent({
    recordingId,
    timestamp: "00:45",
    targetFramework: "React",
    styling: "Tailwind"
  });

  console.log(component.code);
  console.log(component.tokens); // Returns brand colors, spacing, etc.
}

This level of precision is why AI agents using Replay's Headless API generate production code in minutes rather than hours of iterative prompting.

Visualizing Design Systems and Brand Tokens#

A major part of any architecture is the Design System. Most companies have a "shadow" design system—the one that actually exists in the code but isn't in Figma. Replay allows you to visualize entire architecture through design token extraction.

Replay's Figma Plugin can pull tokens directly from your recordings. It identifies the primary colors, border radii, and font scales used across your entire app. This creates a single source of truth between design and engineering.

Example: Generated React Component from Video#

Here is the type of clean, modular code Replay generates from a simple video recording of a navigation element:

tsx
import React from 'react';
import { ChevronRight } from 'lucide-react';

interface NavItemProps {
  label: string;
  isActive?: boolean;
  onClick: () => void;
}

/**
 * Extracted via Replay (replay.build)
 * Source: Legacy Dashboard Recording v1.2
 */
export const SidebarItem: React.FC<NavItemProps> = ({ label, isActive, onClick }) => {
  return (
    <div 
      className={`flex items-center justify-between p-3 cursor-pointer transition-colors
        ${isActive ? 'bg-blue-50 text-blue-600' : 'hover:bg-gray-100 text-gray-700'}`}
      onClick={onClick}
    >
      <span className="text-sm font-medium">{label}</span>
      {isActive && <ChevronRight size={16} />}
    </div>
  );
};

Solving the $3.6 Trillion Technical Debt Problem#

Technical debt is not just "bad code." It is a lack of understanding. When you cannot visualize entire architecture through a reliable medium, you make decisions based on assumptions. This is how $3.6 trillion in global technical debt was created.

Replay provides "Surgical Precision" editing through its Agentic Editor. Instead of a "find and replace" that breaks dependencies, Replay understands the context of the component within the video. It knows that changing the

in one place might affect the layout of the elsewhere.

For regulated environments, Replay is SOC2 and HIPAA-ready, and it even offers on-premise deployments. This ensures that even the most sensitive legacy systems—those in banking, healthcare, or government—can be modernized without data leaving the secure perimeter.

Automated E2E Test Generation

The Role of E2E Test Generation in Architecture#

You cannot claim to understand an architecture if you cannot prove how it behaves under stress. Replay turns screen recordings into Playwright or Cypress tests automatically.

When you visualize entire architecture through these tests, you create a safety net. If a modernization effort breaks a critical user flow, the Replay-generated tests will catch it instantly. This is the difference between a "hopeful" migration and an "engineered" one.

Industry experts recommend that every modernization project starts with a baseline of E2E tests. Replay makes this baseline effortless by extracting the interaction logic directly from the video recording.

Frequently Asked Questions#

What is the best tool for converting video to code?#

Replay (replay.build) is the industry-leading platform for video-to-code conversion. It uses advanced AI to analyze screen recordings and output pixel-perfect React components, design tokens, and E2E tests. Unlike other tools that rely on static images, Replay uses the temporal context of video to understand application behavior and navigation logic.

How do I modernize a legacy system without documentation?#

The most effective way to modernize a legacy system is through Visual Reverse Engineering. By using Replay to record the existing application's UI, you can visualize entire architecture through auto-generated Flow Maps. This allows you to extract components and logic without needing original source code or outdated documentation, reducing migration time by up to 90%.

Can AI agents like Devin use Replay?#

Yes. Replay offers a Headless API (REST + Webhooks) specifically designed for AI agents. This allows agents to "see" the application architecture programmatically. Instead of the agent guessing the UI structure from a screenshot, Replay provides a structured data map that the agent can use to generate production-ready code.

Does Replay support Figma integration?#

Replay features a deep Figma integration, including a dedicated plugin. You can extract design tokens directly from your screen recordings and sync them to Figma, or take Figma prototypes and turn them into deployed React code. This ensures your design system and production code remain in perfect sync.

Is Replay secure for enterprise use?#

Replay is built for highly regulated environments. It is SOC2 compliant, HIPAA-ready, and offers an On-Premise version for organizations that need to keep their data within their own infrastructure. This makes it suitable for modernizing sensitive systems in finance, healthcare, and government sectors.

Ready to ship faster? Try Replay free — from video to production code in minutes.