---
title: "Where technologists look for answers — Community data 2026"
url: https://survey.stackoverflow.co/2026/community/data/answers
year: 2026
chapter: "community"
question: "Answers"
section: "Finding and trusting answers"
licence: "ODbL 1.0 (https://opendatacommons.org/licenses/odbl/1-0/)"
---

# Where technologists look for answers

Online search (83%) and AI agents (70%) are the top two answer-seeking channels, both outpacing maintained repositories (44%) and trusted humans (29%). The implication: answer-seeking is now a self-serve, AI-augmented activity — human consultation is a third or fourth resort, not a first.

Asked as: Which actions do you turn to first when trying to find answers to a problem? Select your top 3 choices. (`Answers`, multi select, optional, v2026.1)

## Options offered

1. Use online search tools to find general guidance and/or discourse
2. Send a message to a human I trust directly
3. Send a message to a human that I don't know directly
4. Post a message in a group text or private discussion among humans I know
5. Ask an AI agent
6. Post in a public online forum
7. Go directly to a maintained repository or more than one and search within its contents (this could be a repository like Wikipedia or IMDB or GitHub projects)

## Results

### All Respondents

n = 16,664

|  | Respondents | Percent |
| --- | ---: | ---: |
| Use online search tools to find general guidance and/or discourse | 13,774 | 82.7% |
| Ask an AI agent | 11,643 | 69.9% |
| Go directly to a maintained repository or more than one and search within its contents (this could be a repository like Wikipedia or IMDB or GitHub projects) | 7,288 | 43.7% |
| Send a message to a human I trust directly | 4,803 | 28.8% |
| Post a message in a group text or private discussion among humans I know | 2,462 | 14.8% |
| Post in a public online forum | 1,327 | 8.0% |
| Send a message to a human that I don't know directly | 276 | 1.7% |

In context: https://survey.stackoverflow.co/2026/community/data.md