Languages

Objective-C is objectively retired

Having lost two-thirds of its users in the past six years, Objective-C appears to be reaching the end of its lifespan. In the past year, it was used by fewer than 2% of programmers at least once, and only 11 survey participants reported it as their primary language. The decline in usage of Objective-C has outpaced even that of COBOL and Perl.

The language had a good run from its introduction in 1984 until Apple released its successor, Swift, in 2014. With other cross-platform languages, such as Kotlin, Dart, and more, iOS developers are spoiled for choice and have few reasons to hang on to Objective-C.

JavaScript: A subtle dip in popularity

Last year, the top three languages were neck and neck in terms of popularity. This year, there still isn’t much between them – Java retook first place, with JavaScript dropping to third after losing three percentage points.

It seems that some programmers who started using TypeScript in tandem with another language are gradually transitioning to using it exclusively. In 2020, 47% of TypeScript users used it alongside JavaScript; this year, that number fell to 38%. It’s plausible to assume that we’ll witness a further decline in the share of JavaScript by a few more percentage points in the future.

The proportion of programmers who would like to learn another language is higher among JavaScript users than that of other languages. This also increases the chances of user attrition, with TypeScript benefitting from user migration.

The values in this table denote how many users of the languages listed across the columns (horizontally) plan to migrate to a language listed down the rows (vertically). For example, 10% of C# users plan to adopt Rust.

For many years, Rust was among the most popular languages to learn. In 2023, and for the first time, Rust has taken the top spot.

Not only has Rust overtaken Go to become the top choice for those looking to migrate to another language, but Go users are also the first in line of those ready to adopt Rust.

However, since Go’s user base experienced rapid growth up until 2020, a significant portion of those transitioning from Go most likely represent early adopters. Many of these trendsetters are looking for the next big thing and, after adopting Rust, could soon move on to the next “big” trend.