The State of Developer Ecosystem 2023
This report is the culmination of insights gathered from 26,348 developers from all around the globe. The world of developers is vast and diverse, making it an endlessly fascinating realm for exploration and learning. Through yearly research initiatives like this one, our goal is to explore this captivating world, uncover valuable insights about developers and their craft, and then share these facts with the community.
Within the State of Developer Ecosystem Report, you'll find information covering a wide range of topics, from programming languages, tools, and technologies to demographics and fun facts. We'll also take a look at the unique lifestyle of developers, shedding light on their passions and interests.
This year, we've also extended our inquiry to AI. We've examined developers’ views on AI, their concerns, the commonly used features of AI assistants, and the current adoption of AI-enhanced tools.
This is a public report, and its contents may be used as long as the source is appropriately credited.
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In 2023, Scala, Go, and Kotlin developers rank as the top three highest-paid categories. Employers are recognizing the value of specialists who can navigate the complexities of these languages, resulting in a competitive landscape where developers in Scala, Go, and Kotlin stand out as the top earners.
Since 2021, our survey data has consistently shown no improvement in the share of female developers. That only 5% of developers are women indicates an enormous gender gap in the industry. To ensure equal opportunities and representation for all, we as a community should come up with new approaches to address gender diversity issues.
Notably, in 2023, South Korea is showing a promising trend with 14% of female programmers under the age of 30. It is likely a result of strategic, long-term government policies in place since the mid-1990s aimed at promoting gender equality and encouraging women to pursue careers in IT.
Read more about gender balance, salaries, geography, and other developer trends in the Demographics section.
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77%
of developers use ChatGPT.
46%
of developers use GitHub Copilot.
The most common way developers use an AI assistant is to ask general questions about software development using natural language.
JetBrains AI Assistant
AI Assistant provides AI-powered features for software development. The JetBrains AI service transparently connects IDE users to different large language models (LLMs). AI Assistant is context-aware and helps developers complete their tasks faster, boosting productivity.
Try for freeFor more about artificial intelligence usage in software development in 2023, see our brand new AI section.
In 2023, developers who are no strangers to burnout show a stronger interest in their mental health, with a 7 percentage points higher engagement compared to those who haven't experienced burnout. They are also 6 percentage points more likely to use self-monitoring apps or devices to track their physical activity and sleep quality.
Interestingly, burnout-affected developers find that factors related to mental health, such as self-organization and time management, significantly impact their coding productivity. Conversely, developers who haven't faced burnout link their productivity boosts to factors less connected to mental health, such as learning new IDEs and upgrading IDE functionality.
73%
of developers have experienced burnout in their career.
For more in-depth information on mental health in the developer community, go to the Developers’ Lifestyles section.
Our Developers’ Lifestyles section has more on the latest trends in developer education and training.
As you can see from the two charts above, in 2023, most developers reported that they primarily learned programming in universities and other formal educational institutions. On the other hand, in the fields of data science, machine learning, or data engineering, more than half of respondents reported being self-taught.
Check out the Data Science section for more insights into data science, data analytics, and machine learning.
63%
of developers use Docker.
Explore infrastructure development, hosting, containers, configuration management tools, and infrastructure provisioning insights in our DevOps section.
58%
of respondents involved in testing activities report that they develop automated tests.
46%
of respondents use test case design as part of their testing process.
You can learn more about the testing practices used by developers and QA engineers in the Testing section.
41%
of respondents have contributed to open-source projects; 20% do it more or less regularly.
See the Development section for additional facts on open-source, cross-platform, static analysis, and other topics.
49%
of respondents engage in remote development.
61%
report to have practiced collaborative development, with 45% having done so online and 30% face to face.
Learn more in the Remote Development section.
Mobile app usage for communication tools has clearly been taking a dive after peaking in 2020 and 2021. The probable reason is that more employees are returning to the office, which many companies seem to be encouraging.
Visit the Team Tools section for more on issue-tracking tools, version control systems, CI/CD tools, and communication tools.
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