2018 GLOBAL DEVELOPER HIRING LANDSCAPE...Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018 4 Developer Type...
Transcript of 2018 GLOBAL DEVELOPER HIRING LANDSCAPE...Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018 4 Developer Type...
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018
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Methodology• Qualified Responses Worldwide
Demographics• Location
• Developer Type
• Gender
• Age
Education• Professional & Student Developers
• Educational Attainment
• Field of Study
• Non-Degree Education
• Bootcamps
• Hackathons
• Years Since First Learning to Code
Work• Employment Status
• Company Size
• Industry
• Career & Job Satisfaction
• Five-Year Plan
• Job-Seeking Status
• Last Job
• What’s Important in a New Job
• How to Contact Developers
• What Benefits Are Important
TABLE OF CONTENTS
• What to Say When Recruiting Developers
• The Job Search Process
• Salary
• Coding as a Hobby
• Connection & Competition
• Committing Code
Technology• Programming Languages
• Database Environments
• Platforms
• Libraries, Frameworks, & Tools
• Development Environments
• Operating Systems
• Methodologies
• Version Control
• Knowledge-Sharing & Communication Tools
• Correlated Technologies
Artificial Intelligence• What Developers Think About AI
• Responsibilities for Considering Ramifications of AI
• The Future of AI
Stack Overflow• Visits
• Participation
• How to Describe
In today’s world, nearly every company is making the necessary shift towards embracing technology. Those that don’t are moving down a path towards eventual irrelevance. Naturally, developers are essential to this movement and therefore essential to every company’s survival. Successful companies can embrace technology by investing in hiring developers, ensuring they are efficient and productive, and evangelizing their technology to support the company’s greater mission.
To achieve all of the above, it’s important to truly understand developers.
As the largest, most trusted online developer community, more than 50 million professional and aspiring programmers visit Stack Overflow each month. Each year, we survey the programming community on topics ranging from their ideal working environment to their thoughts on artificial intelligence.
Over 100,000 respondents from around the world participated this year, making it the world’s largest and most comprehensive developer survey. Discover everything you need to know about developers with The Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018.
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METHODOLOGYThis report is based on a survey of 101,592 software developers from 183 countries around the world. This number of responses are what we consider “qualified” for analytical purposes based on completion and time spent on the survey. Approximately 20,000 additional responses were started, but not included in the analysis because respondents did not answer enough questions. Of the qualified responses, 67,441 (66.4%) completed the entire survey.
Qualified Responses Worldwide • The survey was fielded from January 8 to January 28.
• The median time spent on the survey for qualified responses was 25.8 minutes, and the median time for those who finished the entire survey was 29.4 minutes.
• Respondents were recruited primarily through channels owned by Stack Overflow. The top 5 sources of respondents were banner ads, email lists, house ads, blog posts, and Twitter. Since respondents were recruited in this way, highly engaged users on Stack Overflow were more likely to notice the links for the survey and click to begin it. Respondents who finished the survey were awarded a “Census” badge as a motivation to complete the survey.
• We treated responses as qualified for analysis if the user spent a certain amount of time relative to how far they got into the survey. Most survey responses that spent less than 5 minutes were excluded from the final sample.
• We asked respondents about their salary. First, we asked what currency each respondent typically used. Then we asked that respondent what their salary was in that currency, and whether that salary was weekly, monthly, or yearly.
• For a short time on the first day, there was a bug that left out the last part of the question (weekly vs. monthly vs. yearly); those salary responses are not included here.
• We converted salaries from user currencies to USD using the exchange rate on 2018-01-18, and also converted to annual salaries assuming 12 working months and 50 working weeks.
• This question, like most on the survey, was optional. There were 58,650 respondents (57.7% of qualified respondents) who gave us salary data.
• The top approximately 1% of salaries inside and outside of the US were trimmed and replaced with threshold values. The threshold values for inside and outside the US were different.
• Many questions were only shown to respondents based on their previous answers. For example, questions about jobs and work were only shown to those who said they were working in a job.
• The questions were organized into several blocks of questions, which were randomized in order. Also, the answers to most questions were randomized in order.
• Due to an error, Oracle and SQLite were excluded from the question about databases for the first day of the survey. We carefully examined whether the results for the other databases changed from the first day compared to the rest of the survey fielding period and they did not. The results shown here for database use and most loved/dreaded/wanted databases only use responses from after Oracle and SQLite were added to the possible answers.
EUROPE
39,001NORTH AMERICA
25,016
ASIA
24,700SOUTH AMERICA
4,162
AFRICA
2,869AUSTRALIA/OCEANIA
2,591
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018
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Developer TypeOver half of our respondents identified as Back-End Developers.
LocationDevelopers live (and code) all over the world. This year, about 20% of our respondents said they are located in the United States. The next-most represented countries are India, Germany, the UK, and Canada.
United States
India
Germany
United Kingdom
Canada
Russian Federation
France
Brazil
Poland
20.6%
13.9%
6.6%
6.3%
3.4%
2.9%
2.6%
2.5%
2.2%
Australia
Netherlands
Spain
Italy
Ukraine
Sweden
Pakistan
China
Switzerland
Turkey
Israel
Iran, Islamic Republic of...
Romania
Austria
Czech Republic
Belgium
DEMOGRAPHICSDevelopers all over the world are writing the script for the future. Here’s what they look like.
57.9%
48.2%
37.8%
20.4%
17.2%
17.1%
14.3%
13.1%
11.3%
10.4%
8.2%
7.7%
6.7%
5.7%
5.2%
5%
4.7%
4%
3.8%
1.2%
Back-end developer
Full-stack developer
Front-end developer
Mobile developer
Desktop or enterprise applications developer
Student
Database administrator
Designer
System administrator
DevOps specialist
Data or business analyst
Data scientist or machine learning specialist
QA or test developer
Engineering manager
Embedded applications or devices developer
Game or graphics developer
Product manager
Educator or academic researcher
C-suite executive (CEO, CTO, etc.)
Marketing or sales professional
2%
1.9%
1.8%
1.6%
1.3%
1.2%
1.1%
1.1%
1%
1%
1%
0.9%
0.8%
0.8%
0.8%
0.8%
GenderOver 90% of our respondents are male. According to Quantcast, women account for about 10% of Stack Overflow’s US traffic—this year 9% of US survey respondents are women. Therefore, we had survey participation at almost the rate we would expect from our traffic.
AgeAbout three-quarters of professional developers who took our survey are younger than 35.
Male
Under 18 years old
35 - 44 years old
65 years or older
45 - 54 years old
55 - 64 years old
18 - 24 years old
25 - 34 years old
Non-binary, genderqueer, or gender non-conforming
Transgender
Female92.7%
0.9% 0.7%
1.9%
18.2% 5.1% 1.4%
0.2%
22.4% 50.8%
6.8%
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EDUCATIONSee how the world’s developers are learning to code through traditional and non-traditional forms of education.
Professional & Student DevelopersDevelopers in all stages of their careers come to Stack Overflow, including professionals, hobbyists, and students. About one-quarter of this year’s respondents are currently enrolled in a full-time or part-time formal college or university program.
Educational AttainmentAbout three-quarters of professional developers worldwide have the equivalent of a bachelor’s degree or higher. However, it’s not rare to find accomplished professional developers who haven’t completed a degree or any type of “formal” schooling.
Currently Enrolled
I never completed any formal education
Primary/elementary school
Secondary school
Some college/university study without earning a degree
Associate degree
Bachelor’s degree
Master’s degree
Professional degree
Doctoral degree
0.6%
1.3%
8.2%
12.1%
3.1%
47.7%
23.2%
1.5%
2.2%
Highest Level of Education Completed
No
74.2%
Yes, full-time
19.4%
Yes, part-time
6.4%
Field of StudyOver 60% of professional developers who studied at the university level said they majored in computer science, computer engineering, or software engineering. Additionally, this proportion is somewhat higher in currently-enrolled students (about 70%).
The proportion of respondents majoring in other engineering disciplines, like electrical and mechanical engineering, is lower among current students than among professionals.
64.4%
8.5%
8.3%
3.6%
3.5%
3.1%
2.3%
2%
1.7%
1.4%
0.8%
0.3%
63.7%
8.8%
8.2%
3.9%
3.6%
3.1%
2.4%
2%
1.7%
1.4%
0.9%
0.3%
Computer science, computer engineering, or software engineering
Another engineering discipline (ex. civil, electrical, mechanical)
Information systems, information technology, or system administration
A natural science (ex. biology, chemistry, physics)
Mathematics or statistics
Web development or web design
A business discipline (ex. accounting, finance, marketing)
A humanities discipline (ex. literature, history, philosophy)
A social science (ex. anthropology, psychology, political science)
Fine arts or performing arts (ex. graphic design, music, studio art)
I never declared a major
A health science (ex. nursing, pharmacy, radiology)
Fields of Study of Professional Developers
Fields of Study of Student Developers
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018EDUCATION
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Tapping your network of friends, family, and peers versed in the technology
A college/university computer science or software engineering book
Internal Wikis, chat rooms, or documentation set up by my company for employees
Pre-scheduled tutoring or mentoring sessions with a friend or colleague
Non-Degree EducationDevelopers are lifelong learners—almost 90% of all developers say they have taught themselves a new language, framework, or tool outside of their formal education. Among professional developers, almost half say they have taken an online course like a MOOC, and about a quarter have participated in a hackathon.
We also asked developers the ways that they learn new skills or languages. Good documentation ranked highly, as did Stack Overflow Q&A.
Ways Developers Learn on Their Own
83.5%
82.8%
50.4%
50%
48.3%
The official documentation and/or standards for the technology
Questions & answers on Stack Overflow
A book or e-book from O’Reilly, Apress, or a similar publisher
Online developer communities other than Stack Overflow
The technology’s online help system
Non-Traditional Ways to Learn
24.5%
17.8%
14.1%
10.5%
Participated in online coding competitions (e.g. HackerRank, CodeChef, TopCoder)
Taken a part-time in-person course in programming or software development
Completed an industry certification program (e.g. MCPD)
Participated in a full-time developer training program or bootcamp
19.2%
19.2%
16.4%
4.1%
Taught yourself a new language, framework, or tool without taking a formal course
Taken an online course in programming or software development (e.g. a MOOC)
Contributed to open source software
Received on-the-job training in software development
Participated in a hackathon
87%
48.6%
41.6%
36.1%
26.9%
BootcampsBootcamps are typically perceived as a way for newcomers to transition into a career as a software developer— but according to our survey, many participants in coding bootcamps were already working as developers. Almost half of our respondents who went to a coding bootcamp said they were already working as developers (these developers are likely updating their skills and moving to new areas of the tech industry.) Of other bootcamp participants, the most common outcome is to find a job immediately or soon after graduating.
Bootcamp Success
45.5%
16.3%
7.5%
10%
I already had a full-time job as a developer when I began the program
Immediately after graduating
Less than a month
One to three months
Four to six months
Six months to a year
Longer than a year
I haven’t gotten a developer job
5.2%
3.6%
3.2%
8.7%
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018EDUCATION
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HackathonsWe asked our respondents who said they have participated in hackathons or online coding competitions why they invest their time this way. The number one answer is that developers find these events enjoyable. Hackathons are also great opportunities for learning, both general and specific.
Years Since Learning to CodeThere’s a wide range of experience levels among developers. One-third of professional developers say they learned to code within the past five years.
We also asked developers how long they had been coding professionally. Over 57% of developers have less than five years of professional coding experience.
Lastly, we can look at the differences in years of experience by developer type. DevOps Specialists and developers who code for desktop and enterprise applications have the most experience, while Game/Graphics Developers and Mobile Developers have the fewest years of experience.
9.6%
24.4%
21.4%
13.5%
8.9%
6.8%
5.6%
2.9%
2%
1.2%
3.8%
0-2 years
3-5 years
6-8 years
9-11 years
12-14 years
15-17 years
18-20 years
21-23 years
24-26 years
27-29 years
30 or more years
30.1%
27.4%
14.6%
9.7%
5.5%
3.9%
3.6%
1.8%
1.1%
0.6%
1.7%
Years Since Professional Developers Learned to Code
How Long Developers Have Been Coding Professionally
Years of Experience by Developer Type
10.2
8
7.7
7.5
7.2
7
6.9
6.3
6.2
6.2
6
5.8
5.5
5.5
5.2
4.6
Engineering manager
DevOps specialist
Desktop or enterprise applications developer
Embedded applications or devices developer
Data or business analyst
System administrator
Database administrator
Full-stack developer
Back-end developer
Educator or academic researcher
Designer
QA or test developer
Front-end developer
Data scientist or machine learning specialist
Mobile developer
Game or graphics developer
76.3% Because I find it enjoyable
66.1%To improve my general technical skills or programming ability
51.2%
To improve my knowledge of a specific programming language, framework, or other technology
30%To improve my ability to work on a team with other programmers
27.5% To build my professional network
20.8% To help me find new job opportunities
18.9% To win prizes or cash awards
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Employment StatusOver 90% of developers are employed at least part-time, making the developer employment rate much higher than those of other professions. Only 16% of developers are actively looking for a job, putting additional pressure on the employers who are competing to hire tech talent.
76.9%
10%
5.1%
5%
2.8%
0.2%
Employed full-time
Independent contractor, freelancer, or self-employed
Employed part-time
Not employed, but looking for work
Not employed, and not looking for work
Retired
IndustryDevelopers work in a diverse range of industries, both inside and outside of technology. Web development or design was the most common industry for professional developers to work in.
16.3%
10.8%
10.8%
10.5%
10%
8.8%
7.2%
5.8%
5.3%
5.1%
5%
4.5%
Web development or design
Other industry not listed here
Information technology
Software as a service (SaaS) development
Other software development
Financial technology or services
Cloud-based solutions or services
Data and analytics
Consulting
Media, advertising, publishing, or entertainment
Retail or eCommerce
Healthcare technology or services
Company SizeDevelopers work for companies of all sizes, ranging from small startups to enterprise organizations.
4.2% 13.6%5,000 to 9,999 employees 10,000 or more employees
10.7%1,000 to 4,999 employees
23.8%20 to 99 employees
10.5%Fewer than 10 employees
19.6%100 to 499 employees
11.2%10 to 19 employees
6.5%500 to 999 employees
WORKNearly every company employs developers. Here’s an inside look at the industries they work in and the companies they work for.
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018WORK
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Career & Job SatisfactionDevelopers tend to be more satisfied with their career in general than with their current job. Overall, career satisfaction does not vary significantly by industry. However, current job satisfaction is significantly lower for developers working in financial services and IT.
Career Satisfaction of Developers
3.4%
6.9%
8.6%
8.3%
17.6%
36.5%
18.7%
Extremely dissatisfied
Moderately dissatisfied
Slightly dissatisfied
Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied
Slightly satisfied
Moderately satisfied
Extremely satisfied
3.6%
9.1%
10.2%
7.2%
14.5%
37.5%
18%
Extremely dissatisfied
Moderately dissatisfied
Slightly dissatisfied
Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied
Slightly satisfied
Moderately satisfied
Extremely satisfied
Five-Year PlanThis year, we asked developers what they hope to be doing in five years time. Developers’ career goals are largely focused on technical work, with just over half of respondents saying they want to be in the same or a different technical role in the future. About a quarter of developers say they want to start their own company.
What Developers Want to be Doing in Five Years
33.9%
25.7%
19.4%
9.9%
6.6%
2.8%
1.7%
Working in a different or more specialized technical role than the one I’m in now
Working as a founder or co-founder of my own company
Doing the same work
Working as an engineering manager or other functional manager
Working as a product manager or project manager
Working in a career completely unrelated to software development
Retirement
Job Satisfaction of Developers
Job-Seeking StatusWhile a full three-quarters of developers are interested in hearing about new job opportunities, only 16% are actively looking.
I’m not actively looking, but I am open to new opportunities
I am not interested in new job opportunities
I am actively looking for a job59.8% 24.3% 15.9%
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018WORK
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18.5%
18.1%
18%
17.9%
17.9%
17.7%
16%
15.6%
15.4%
Educator or academic researcher
Mobile developer
Data scientist or machine learning specialist
Data or business analyst
Game or graphics developer
Designer
Front-end developer
Database administrator
Back-end developer
QA or test developer
Full-stack developer
Embedded applications or devices developer
System administrator
Desktop or enterprise applications developer
Engineering manager
DevOps specialist
Product manager
C-suite executive (CEO, CTO, etc.)
15.3%
15.2%
14.8%
14.5%
14.4%
13.6%
13.5%
13%
12%
Developers Who Are Actively Looking for a Job
Last JobFrequent job changes for developers are the norm—about half of developers have taken a new job within the past two years.
Of the 16% of professional developers who are actively looking for a job, those who work at the C-level or as Engineering Managers are looking for work the least. Mobile Developers and Game/Graphics Developers are looking for work at higher proportions.
Less than a year ago
Between 1 and 2 years ago
Between 2 and 4 years ago
More than 4 years ago
I’ve never had a job
34.6% 22% 18.8%
18.9% 5.8%
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018WORK
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What’s Important in a New JobDevelopers assess potential jobs differently than their counterparts. Overall, their top priorities in a new job are the compensation and benefits offered, followed by the specific technologies that they’ll work with.
We looked into this criteria further by gender. We found that developers who are not men rank the company’s culture and office environment as their highest concern when assessing a new job. If you’re looking to diversify your workforce, be sure to keep this in mind.
The compensation and benefits offered
The languages, frameworks, and other technologies I’d be working with
Opportunities for professional development
The office environment or company culture
The opportunity to work from home/remotely
The industry that I’d be working in
How widely used or impactful the product or service I’d be working on is
The specific department or team I’d be working on
The financial performance or funding status of the company or organization
The diversity of the company or organization
How Developers Assess Potential Jobs
18.3%
17.3%
16%
13.6%
10.3%
7.4%
6.5%
5.5%
3.4%
1.6%
Highest Priority
2.8%
3.2%
2.6%
3%
12.5%
13.7%
9.2%
8.6%
14.1%
30.4%
Lowest Priority
19%
17.6%
15.7%
13.5%
10.3%
7.3%
6.6%
5.5%
3.3%
1.3%
What MenLook For
14.1%
16.4%
16.8%
16.9%
10.2%
7.3%
5.4%
5.9%
2.6%
4.3%
What WomenLook For
14.6%
15.9%
10.7%
22.5%
11.9%
9.3%
7%
6.4%
1.8%
13.9%
What Non-Binary Developers Look For
How to Contact DevelopersWe asked developers how they would prefer to be contacted about a job that is a good fit, and by far they choose an email to their personal address as their top option. An email to their work address is ranked lowest.
Email to my private address
63.9% Telephone call13.7% Message on a job site
10.9%
Email to my work address
7.2% Message on a social media site
4.3%
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018WORK
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Childcare benefit
Parental leave
Company-provided meals or snacks
Fitness or wellness benefit (ex. gym membership, nutritionist)
Stock options or shares
Transportation benefit (ex. company-provided transportation, public transit allowance)
Retirement or pension savings matching
Conference or education budget
Computer/office equipment allowance
Health insurance
Salary and/or bonuses
What Benefits are ImportantWhen developers are assesing a potential job, they care most about their salary and/or bonuses. They care less about things like fitness benefits and company-provided meals.
What Developers Value in Benefits and Compensation - Highest Priority
What Developers Value in Benefits and Compensation - Lowest Priority
70.2%
8.6%
4.7%
3.6%
3.2%
2.1%
2%
1.5%
1.5%
1.4%
1.1%
Salary and/or bonuses
Health insurance
Computer/office equipment allowance
Conference or education budget
Stock options or shares
Retirement or pension savings matching
Parental leave
Fitness or wellness benefit (ex. gym membership, nutritionist)
Transportation benefit (ex. company-provided transportation, public transit allowance)
Company-provided meals or snacks
Childcare benefit
21.7%
14.1%
12.3%
11.1%
10.3%
9.5%
6.5%
5%
4.8%
4%
0.7%
What to Say When Recruiting DevelopersWhen we asked developers to rank what they most want to see in an email from a company about a prospective job, the top choices are specific details about technologies used at the job and a salary estimate.
21.7%
21%
19.9%
19.7%
8.2%
6%
3.4%
An estimate of the compensation range
Details on the company I’d be working for
Specifics of why they think I’d be a good fit for the role (ex. my prior work history, projects on GitHub)
Details of which technologies I’d be working with
Details on the specific department I’d be working for or product I’d be working on
Information on the company’s hiring process
Details on the company’s product development process
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018WORK
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The Job Search ProcessWe asked developers what they found annoying, exhausting, interesting, and exciting about the process of searching for a new job in separate free response questions. Respondents talked about the new opportunities, technologies, and people that a new job can offer, but expressed frustration with broken processes around interviews and recruiting.
Words Used to Describe the Annoying Part of Job Searching
Words Used to Describe the Exhausting Part of Job Searching
18.5%
17.8%
10.4%
10%
7%
4.8%
4.6%
3.9%
3.8%
3.7%
3.4%
3.3%
3.1%
3.1%
3.1%
3%
2.9%
2.8%
2.8%
2.8%
interview
job
company
finding
recruiter
time
waiting
getting
application
good
letter
process
work
resume
find
right
writing
searching
fit
interviewing
19.8%
13.3%
12.3%
9.8%
6.6%
5%
4.3%
4.2%
3.5%
3.4%
3.3%
3.2%
3.2%
3.1%
3.1%
2.9%
2.9%
2.9%
2.7%
2.7%
job
interview
recruiter
company
time
finding
salary
getting
process
information
application
employer
lack
experience
work
resume
response
waiting
offer
people
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018WORK
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new
company
opportunity
people
technology
seeing
learning
job
interview
finding
different
work
know
getting
meeting
interesting
get
working
market
thing
Words Used to Describe the Interesting Part of Job Searching
32.7%
18%
12.8%
9.5%
9.4%
8.7%
8.2%
7.9%
7.8%
6.3%
5.8%
5.4%
5%
4.7%
4.6%
3.9%
2.8%
2.8%
2.7%
2.7%
new
opportunity
company
people
job
interview
technology
getting
work
finding
learning
meeting
know
seeing
salary
thing
challenge
working
different
something
42%
16.7%
9.8%
8.9%
8.6%
7.6%
6.6%
6.4%
5.9%
5.8%
5.4%
4.5%
3.4%
3.4%
3.1%
3.1%
2.9%
2.9%
2.8%
2.8%
Words Used to Describe the Exciting Part of Job Searching
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018WORK
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Salary and Experience by Developer Type
Average years of professional programming experience
Med
ian
sala
ry (U
SD)
$90,
000
$80,
000
$70,
000
$60,
000
$50,
000
$40,
000
6 8 107 9 11
Number of respondents10,000 20,000
Engineering manager
Database administrator
Data scientist
Data or business analyst
Full-stack developer
Back-end developer
System administratorQA or test developerFront-end developer
Designer
Educator or academic researcher
Game or graphics developer
Mobile developer
Embedded/devices developer
Desktop or enterprise applications developer
Product manager
DevOps specialist
CTO/CEO/etc
$ 89,000
$ 72,000
$ 60,000
$ 59,000
$ 59,000
$ 59,000
$ 57,000
$ 56,000
$ 56,000
$ 55,000
$ 51,000
$ 51,000
$ 46,000
$ 44,000
$ 43,000
$ 40,000
Engineering manager
DevOps specialist
Data scientist or machine learning specialist
Data or business analyst
Embedded applications or devices developer
Full-stack developer
Desktop or enterprise applications developer
Back-end developer
System administrator
QA or test developer
Database administrator
Front-end developer
Designer
Educator or academic researcher
Mobile developer
Game or graphics developer
SalaryAcross the globe, Engineering Managers, DevOps Specialists, and Data Scientists command the highest salaries.
Naturally, developers with more years of experience are paid more—but we also see that some type of coding work is paid more highly at the same level of experience. Data Scientists and DevOps Specialists are high earners for their level of experience.
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018WORK
16
Developers using languages that appear above the yellow line in this chart, such as Go, Clojure, and F#, are being paid more even given how much experience they have. Developers using languages below the blue line, like PHP and Visual Basic 6, however, are paid less even given years of experience. The size of the circles in this chart represents how many developers are using that language compared to the others.
Salary and Experience by Programming Language
Footnote
See our Methodology section for information on how we converted local currencies used by respondents to U.S. dollars
Average years of professional programming experience
Med
ian
sala
ry (U
SD)
$80,000
$70,000
$60,000
$50,000
6 8 10 12
Number of respondents
10,000 20,000 30,000
Clojure
F#
Cobol
Visual Basic 6
ScalaHack
Rust
Ocami
Go
Erlang
Groovy
Perl
C#
Objective-C
Kotlin
Java
Swift
Julia
Python
Bash/Shell
Matlab
Haskell
CoffeeScript
TypeScript
Ruby
Assembly
JavaScript
CSS
C++
C
R
Delphi/Object Pascal
HTML
SQL
PHP
VBA
Lua
VB.NET
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018WORK
17
3.6 5 2.7 5 2.2 5
Coding as a HobbyLots of developers code outside of work—in fact, over 80% of respondents said that they code as a hobby.
Additionally, 56% of respondents said that they contribute to open source projects.
Committing CodeThe majority of developers check in code multiple times per day, and professional developers are less likely to check in code “never” or “rarely”.
How Many Developers Code Outside of Work
How Many Developers Contribute to Open Source
Connection & CompetitionWe asked respondents how much they agree or disagree with several statements about their place in the developer community. Overall, 70% of developers agree or strongly agree that they feel a sense of connection with other developers. Developers are overall confident about their own skills compared to their peers, with only 18% agreeing or strongly agreeing that they are not as good at programming as their colleagues.
No No19.2% 43.6%
Multiple times per day
Weekly or a few times per month
62.4%
6.2%
A few times per week
Less than once per month
18.5%
2.7%
Once a day
Never
9.2%
1.1%
I feel a sense of kinship or connection to other developers
I think of myself as competing with my peers
I’m not as good at programming as most of my peers
80.8% 56.4%Yes Yes
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018WORK
18
Years of Experience and Feelings of BelongingDevelopers’ feelings on how much they belong and how they stack up to their peers change with how much experience they have. More experienced developers feel more connected, more confident, and less competitive. Notice that feeling less skilled drops quickly with experience, while feeling less competitive drops more gradually and continues to drop into the second decade of coding experience.
Years of coding experience
% w
ho a
gree
or s
tron
gly
agre
e
80%
60%
40%
20%
0%
0 10 20 30
I feel a sense of kinship or connection to other developers
I think of myself as competing with my peers
I am not as good at programming as most of my peers
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018
19
Programming LanguagesFor the sixth year in a row, JavaScript is the most commonly used programming language. Python continues to rise in the ranks, surpassing C# this year, much like it surpassed PHP last year. As a result, Python has a solid claim to being the fastest-growing major programming language.
We see close alignment in the technology choices of professional developers and the developer population overall.
For the third year in a row, Rust is the most loved programming language among our respondents, followed close behind by Kotlin, a language we asked about for the first time on our survey this year. This means that proportionally, more developers want to continue working with these than other languages.
Most Popular Programming Scripting and Markup Languages
Most Loved Programming Scripting and Markup Languages
TECHNOLOGYJavaScript
HTML
CSS
SQL
Java
Bash/Shell
Python
69.8%
68.5%
65.1%
57%
45.3%
39.8%
38.8%
Rust
Kotlin
Python
TypeScript
Go
Swift
JavaScript
78.9%
75.1%
68%
67%
65.6%
65.1%
61.9%
C#
F#
Clojure
Bash/Shell
Scala
SQL
HTML
60.4%
59.6%
59.6%
59.1%
58.5%
57.5%
55.7%
CSS
Haskell
Julia
Java
R
Ruby
Erlang
55.1%
53.6%
52.8%
50.7%
49.4%
47.4%
47.2%
C++
Hack
PHP
Ocaml
46.7%
42.1%
41.6%
41.5%
C#
PHP
C++
C
TypeScript
Ruby
Swift
34.4%
30.7%
25.4%
23%
17.4%
10.1%
8.1%
Assembly
Go
Objective-C
VB.NET
R
Matlab
VBA
7.4%
7.1%
7%
6.7%
6.1%
5.8%
4.9%
Kotlin
Scala
Groovy
Perl
4.5%
4.4%
4.3%
4.2%
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018
20
TECHNOLOGY
Most Dreaded Programming Scripting and Markup LanguagesAlso for the third year in a row, Visual Basic 6 ranks as the most dreaded programming language. “Most dreaded” means that a high percentage of developers who are currently using the technology express no interest in continuing to do so.
Python is the most wanted language for the second year in a row, meaning that it is the language that developers who do not yet use it most often say they want to learn.
Julia
Haskell
CSS
HTML
47.2%
46.4%
44.9%
44.3%
Visual Basic 6
Cobol
CoffeeScript
VB.NET
VBA
Matlab
Assembly
89.9%
84.1%
82.7%
80.9%
80%
77.4%
71.4%
Perl
Objective-C
Lua
Groovy
Delphi/Object Pascal
C
Ocaml
71.3%
70.3%
68.2%
66.4%
65.1%
62.6%
58.5%
PHP
Hack
C++
Erlang
Ruby
R
Java
58.4%
57.9%
53.3%
52.8%
52.6%
50.6%
49.3%
Most Wanted Programming Scripting and Markup Languages
Python
JavaScript
Go
Kotlin
TypeScript
Java
C++
25.1%
19%
16.2%
12.4%
11.9%
10.5%
10.2%
Rust
C#
Swift
HTML
CSS
SQL
R
8.3%
8%
7.7%
7.6%
7.6%
6.8%
6.3%
C
Ruby
Scala
Haskell
Bash/Shell
PHP
F#
5.9%
5.7%
5.6%
5.3%
4.9%
4.1%
4%
Assembly
Erlang
Clojure
Objective-C
3.4%
3%
2.7%
2.6%
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018
21
TECHNOLOGY
Database EnvironmentsMuch like last year, MySQL and SQL Server are the most commonly used databases.
For the second year in a row, Redis is the most loved database, meaning that proportionally more developers wanted to continue working with it than any other database. IBM’s Db2 offering ranks as the most dreaded database, and for the second year in a row, MongoDB is the most wanted database.
Most Popular Databases
MySQL
SQL Server
PostgreSQL
MongoDB
SQLite
Redis
Elasticsearch
58.7%
41.2%
32.9%
25.9%
19.7%
18%
14.1%
MariaDB
Oracle
Microsoft Azure (Tables, CosmosDB, SQL, etc)
Google Cloud Storage
Memcached
Amazon DynamoDB
Amazon RDS/Aurora
13.4%
11.1%
7.9%
5.5%
5.5%
5.2%
5.1%
Cassandra
IBM Db2
Neo4j
Amazon Redshift
Apache Hive
Google BigQuery
Apache HBase
3.7%
2.5%
2.4%
2.2%
2.2%
2.1%
1.7%
Most Loved Databases
Redis
PostgreSQL
Elasticsearch
Amazon RDS/Aurora
Microsoft Azure (Tables, CosmosDB, SQL, etc)
Google Cloud Storage
MongoDB
64.5%
62%
59.9%
58.8%
56.7%
56.5%
55.1%
MariaDB
Google BigQuery
SQL Server
Amazon DynamoDB
Neo4j
MySQL
SQLite
53.3%
52.4%
51.6%
50.9%
49.7%
48.7%
48.1%
Cassandra
Apache Hive
Amazon Redshift
Apache HBase
Memcached
Oracle
IBM Db2
46.4%
46.2%
44.8%
43.6%
42.2%
36.9%
21.8%
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018
22
TECHNOLOGY
Most Dreaded Databases
IBM Db2
Oracle
Memcached
Apache HBase
Amazon Redshift
Apache Hive
Cassandra
78.2%
63.1%
57.8%
56.4%
55.2%
53.8%
53.6%
SQLite
MySQL
Neo4j
Amazon DynamoDB
SQL Server
Google BigQuery
MariaDB
51.9%
51.3%
50.3%
49.1%
48.4%
47.6%
46.7%
MongoDB
Google Cloud Storage
Microsoft Azure (Tables, CosmosDB, SQL, etc)
Amazon RDS/Aurora
Elasticsearch
PostgreSQL
Redis
44.9%
43.5%
43.3%
41.2%
40.1%
38%
35.5%
Most Wanted Databases
MongoDB
Elasticsearch
PostgreSQL
Redis
MySQL
Microsoft Azure (Tables, CosmosDB, SQL, etc)
Google Cloud Storage
18.6%
12.2%
11.4%
9.7%
7.5%
7.3%
7.3%
Cassandra
Amazon DynamoDB
Google BigQuery
SQL Server
Neo4j
Amazon RDS/Aurora
MariaDB
6.1%
5.7%
5.6%
4.2%
3.9%
3.5%
3.4%
Amazon Redshift
SQLite
Memcached
Apache Hive
Apache HBase
Oracle
IBM Db2
3.3%
3.3%
2.7%
2.6%
2.4%
2.3%
0.7%
Redismost loveddatabase
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018
23
TECHNOLOGY
PlatformsLinux and Windows Desktop or Server are the most common choices that our respondents say they have done development work for this year.
Linux is once again the most loved platform for development, with serverless infrastructure also loved this year. SharePoint is the most dreaded development platform for the second year in a row, and many developers say they want to start developing for the Android platform and the Raspberry Pi.
Most Popular Platforms
Most Loved Platforms
Linux
Windows Desktop or Server
Android
AWS
Mac OS
Raspberry Pi
WordPress
48.3%
35.4%
29%
24.1%
17.9%
15.9%
15.9%
Linux
Serverless
AWS
Raspberry Pi
ESP8266
iOS
Apple Watch or Apple TV
76.5%
75.2%
68.6%
67.7%
67.4%
64.6%
64%
Mac OS
Firebase
Android
Google Cloud Platform/App Engine
Gaming console
Windows Desktop or Server
Azure
63.9%
63.8%
63.8%
62.5%
61.3%
61.2%
61%
Arduino
Google Home
Amazon Echo
Heroku
IBM Cloud or Watson
Predix
WordPress
58.1%
57.6%
53.2%
52.2%
43.7%
39.1%
36.8%
Windows Phone
Mainframe
Salesforce
Drupal
31.2%
31.1%
30.3%
29.6%
iOS
Firebase
Azure
Arduino
Heroku
Google Cloud Platform/App Engine
Serverless
15.5%
14.5%
11%
10.6%
10.5%
8%
4.5%
Drupal
Amazon Echo
Windows Phone
SharePoint
ESP8266
Salesforce
Apple Watch or Apple TV
3%
2.9%
2.7%
2.7%
2.2%
2.2%
1.9%
IBM Cloud or Watson
Google Home
Gaming console
Mainframe
1.4%
1.4%
1.3%
0.8%
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018
24
TECHNOLOGY
Most Dreaded Platforms
ESP8266
Raspberry Pi
AWS
Serverless
32.6%
32.3%
31.4%
24.8%
SharePoint
Drupal
Salesforce
Mainframe
Windows Phone
WordPress
Predix
71.8%
70.4%
69.7%
68.9%
68.8%
63.2%
60.9%
IBM Cloud or Watson
Heroku
Amazon Echo
Google Home
Arduino
Azure
Windows Desktop or Server
56.3%
47.8%
46.8%
42.4%
41.9%
39%
38.8%
Gaming console
Google Cloud Platform/App Engine
Android
Firebase
Mac OS
Apple Watch or Apple TV
iOS
38.7%
37.5%
36.2%
36.2%
36.1%
36%
35.4%
Most Wanted Platforms
Android
Raspberry Pi
AWS
Linux
iOS
Firebase
Google Cloud Platform/App Engine
16%
13.1%
12%
10.9%
9.6%
8.3%
8.2%
Arduino
Mac OS
Azure
Amazon Echo
Serverless
Google Home
Gaming console
7.7%
6.6%
6.4%
6.3%
5.6%
5.1%
4.4%
Apple Watch or Apple TV
Heroku
Windows Desktop or Server
IBM Cloud or Watson
WordPress
Windows Phone
ESP8266
3.3%
3.2%
2.7%
2.3%
2.3%
1.2%
1.1%
Salesforce
Drupal
SharePoint
Mainframe
1.1%
0.9%
0.7%
0.6%
Linuxmost lovedplatform fordevelopment
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018
25
TECHNOLOGY
Libraries, Frameworks, & ToolsNode.js and AngularJS continue to be the most commonly used technologies in this category, with React and .NET Core also important to many developers.
TensorFlow, one of the fastest growing technologies on Stack Overflow, is most loved by developers, while Cordova is most dreaded. React is the framework developers say they most want to work with if they do not already.
Most Popular Libraries, Frameworks, & Tools
Node.js
Angular
React
.NET Core
Spring
Django
Cordova
49.6%
36.9%
27.8%
27.2%
17.6%
13%
8.5%
TensorFlow
Xamarin
Spark
Hadoop
Torch/PyTorch
7.8%
7.4%
4.8%
4.7%
1.7%
Most Loved Libraries, Frameworks, & Tools
TensorFlow
React
Torch/PyTorch
Node.js
.NET Core
Spark
Spring
73.5%
69.4%
68%
66.4%
66%
66%
60%
Django
Angular
Hadoop
Xamarin
Cordova
58.3%
54.6%
53.9%
49%
40.4%
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018
26
TECHNOLOGY
Most Dreaded Libraries, Frameworks, & Tools
Cordova
Xamarin
Hadoop
Angular
Django
Spring
Spark
59.6%
51%
46.1%
45.4%
41.7%
40%
34%
.NET Core
Node.js
Torch/PyTorch
React
TensorFlow
34%
33.6%
32%
30.6%
26.5%
Most Wanted Libraries, Frameworks, & Tools
React
Node.js
TensorFlow
Angular
.NET Core
Django
Hadoop
21.3%
20.9%
15.5%
14.3%
9.3%
6.7%
6.4%
Xamarin
Spark
Torch/PyTorch
Spring
Cordova
6.1%
4.8%
4.5%
3.7%
2.6%
TensorFlowmost lovedby developers
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018
27
TECHNOLOGY
Coda
Komodo
Zend
Light Table
0.6%
0.6%
0.4%
0.2%
Development EnvironmentsVisual Studio Code just edged out Visual Studio as the most popular developer environment across the board, but there are differences in tool choices by developer type and role. Developers who write code for mobile apps are more likely to choose Android Studio and XCode, the most popular choice by DevOps and Sysadmins is Vim, and Data Scientists are more likely to work in IPython/Jupyter, PyCharm, and RStudio.
Visual Studio Code
Visual Studio
Notepad++
Sublime Text
Vim
IntelliJ
34.9%
34.3%
34.2%
28.9%
25.8%
24.9%
NetBeans
IPython / Jupyter
Emacs
RStudio
RubyMine
TextMate
8.2%
7.4%
4.1%
3.3%
1.6%
1.1%
Android Studio
Eclipse
Atom
PyCharm
XCode
PHPStorm
19.3%
18.9%
18%
12%
10.6%
9%
Operating SystemsWe asked our respondents what operating systems they use for work. About half said they mainly use Windows, and the remainder were about evenly split between MacOS and Linux.
Windows49.9%
MacOS Linux-based BSD/Unix26.7% 23.2% 0.2%
MethodologiesAgile and Scrum are popular methodologies for developers to keep their projects on track.
Agile
Scrum
Kanban
Pair programming
Extreme programming (XP)
85.4%
62.7%
35.2%
28.4%
15.7%
Formal standard such as ISO 9001 or IEEE 12207 (aka “waterfall” methodologies)
Lean
Evidence-based software engineering
Mob programming
PRINCE2
15.1%
9.6%
3.5%
3.3%
1.5%
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018
28
TECHNOLOGY
Version ControlGit is the dominant choice for version control for developers today, with almost 90% of developers checking in their code via Git.
Knowledge-Sharing & Communication ToolsAbout half of professional developers use Slack, with Jira coming in as second most used. Slack
51.8%Jira Office / productivity suite
(Microsoft Office, Google Suite, etc.)Other wiki tool (Github, Google
Sites, proprietary software, etc.)
Confluence Google Hangouts/Chat Other chat system (IRC, proprietary software, etc.)
Trello
Facebook HipChat
41.6%39.3% 31.4%
29.8% 21.7%21.5%
17.9%
10% 6.2% 3.3%Stack Overflow Enterprise
Git
Subversion
Team Foundation Version Control
Zip file back-ups
87.2%
16.1%
10.9%
7.9%
Copying and pasting files to network shares
I don’t use version control
Mercurial
7.9%
4.8%
3.6%
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018
29
TECHNOLOGY
Correlated TechnologiesTechnologies cluster together into related ecosystems that tend to be used by the same developers. In this chart we use a large central cluster for web development (with JavaScript, HTML, and CSS) connected via SQL to one for Microsoft technologies (with C#, Visual Studio, and .NET Core). Along the bottom we see a constellation connecting Java, Android, and iOS across to Linux, bash/shell, and Python. Other smaller correlated clusters include Scala/Spark, C/C++, and other smaller technologies that include language-specific IDEs.
% of Respondents
Type
DatabaseFrameworkIDELanguagePlatform
Visual Basic 6
SQL ServerXamarin
ESP8266
Arduino
Raspberry Pi
Scala
Spark
HadoopApache HBase
Apache Hive
C#Azure
.NET Core
Visual Studio
Notepad++
Windows Desktop or Server
Apple Watch or Apple TV
Amazon RDS/Aurora
Amazon DynamoDB
Objective-C
Android
Android Studio
Firebase
Kotlin
Java
Eclipse
IntelliJ
Spring
XCode
iOSSwift
Microsoft Azure
Torch/PyTorch
Memcached
Elasticsearch
IPython/Jupyter
Python
Bash/Shell
Linux
Vim
AWS
Mac OS
Django RedisPyCharm
ServerlessPostgreSQL
TensorFlow
MongoDB
MainframeCoffeeScript
Ruby
RubyMine
Assembly
Google BigQueryGoogle Cloud Platform
Google Cloud Storage
Visual Studio Code
TypeScript
AngularNode.js
React
JavaScriptCSS
C++C
R
RStudioDelphi
Cobol
Delphi/Object Pascal
HTML
SQLMySQL
MariaDB
WordPress
PHPStorm
PHP
VBAVB.NET
20%
40%
60%
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018
30
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCEWhat Developers Think About AIMore and more developers are involved in the increasing role of machine learning and artificial intelligence. When asked about AI, there is not much consensus among developers about what is most dangerous—each answer was chosen roughly equally. The top choice for what is exciting about increasing AI is that jobs can be automated, with over 80% of developers not considering this dangerous.
What’s Dangerous About AI
Algorithms making important decisions
Artificial intelligence surpassing human intelligence (“the singularity”)
Evolving definitions of “fairness” in algorithmic versus human decisions
Increasing automation of jobs
28.6%
28%
23.7%
19.8%
What’s Exciting About AI
Increasing automation of jobs
Algorithms making important decisions
Artificial intelligence surpassing human intelligence (“the singularity”)
Evolving definitions of “fairness” in algorithmic versus human decisions
40.8%
23.5%
23.3%
12.4%
Responsibilities for Considering Ramifications of AIDevelopers are most likely to think that the creators and technologists behind the machine learning and AI algorithms are the ones who are ultimately most responsible for the societal issues surrounding artificial intelligence. About a quarter of respondents think that a regulatory body should be primarily responsible.
The Future of AIDevelopers are mostly optimistic about the possibilities that artificial intelligence offers our world, with almost three-quarters of respondents saying that they are overall more excited than worried about the AI future.
Who Should Be Responsible for Issues Around AI
The developers or the people creating the AI
A governmental or other regulatory body
Prominent industry leaders
Nobody
47.8%
27.9%
16.6%
7.7%
How Developers Feel About the Future of AII’m excited about the possibilities more than worried about the dangers.
I’m worried about the dangers more than I’m excited about the possibilities.
I don’t care about it, or I haven’t thought about it.
72.8%
19%
8.2%
Global Developer Hiring Landscape 2018
31
STACK OVERFLOWHow developers use and describe the world’s largest programming community.
VisitsDevelopers visit Stack Overflow. A lot. Over half of our respondents say they are at least daily visitors.
ParticipationDevelopers use Stack Overflow for a variety of reasons. Some programmers visit only to find answers to their questions, while others participate in the community by asking, answering, voting for, or commenting on questions. Over 42% of developers participate on Stack Overflow at least once per week.
How to DescribeUsing free text responses, we asked developers how they would describe Stack Overflow. Developers were overwhelmingly positive about Stack Overflow, focusing on the helpful nature of the community.
I have never visited Stack Overflow (before today)
Less than once per month or monthly
A few times per month or weekly
A few times per week
Daily or almost daily
Multiple times per day
0.5%
2%
11.5%
22.4%
32.5%
31.1%
How Often Developers Visit Stack Overflow
How Often Developers Participate in Stack Overflow
I have never participated in Q&A on Stack Overflow
Less than once per month or monthly
A few times per month or weekly
A few times per week
Daily or almost daily
Multiple times per day
17.3%
39.2%
22.6%
11.7%
5.9%
3.2%
How Developers Describe Stack Overflow
helpful
community
developer
people
question
great
good
help
answer
best
knowledge
place
awesome
problem
sometimes
useful
friendly
helping
can
learn
18.7%
12.2%
10.2%
8.7%
7.3%
7%
6.9%
6.7%
5.8%
5.8%
5.2%
4.9%
4.2%
3.7%
3.5%
3.5%
3.2%
3.2%
3.1%
2.8%
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