Work data 2026 | Stack Overflow Developer Survey

1.1 What and where work happens

	Respondents	Percent
I create code as a primary part of my job	23,234	75.5%
I create code occasionally	4,743	15.4%
I manage or support people who create code	1,170	3.8%
I do not create code	944	3.1%
I review/maintain code but rarely create it	703	2.3%

	Respondents	Percent
Bachelor's degree (B.A., B.S., B.Eng., etc.)	12,396	40.3%
Master's degree (M.A., M.S., M.Eng., MBA, etc.)	7,990	26.0%
Some college/university study without earning a degree	3,813	12.4%
Secondary school (e.g. American high school, German Realschule or Gymnasium, etc.)	2,431	7.9%
Professional degree (JD, MD, Ph.D, Ed.D, etc.)	1,812	5.9%
Associate degree (A.A., A.S., etc.)	942	3.1%
Primary/elementary school	706	2.3%
Other, please specify	671	2.2%

Employment status

Employment varies notably by country: Germany 73%, France 71%, USA 69%, India 58%. India also has the highest student share at 19%.

Question

Which of the following best describes your current employment status?

	Respondents	Percent
Employed	20,259	65.6%
Independent contractor, freelancer, or self-employed	4,607	14.9%
Student	3,139	10.2%
Not employed	1,742	5.6%
Retired	607	2.0%
I prefer not to say	549	1.8%

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	None of the above	Caring for dependents (children, elderly, etc.)	Engaged in paid work (20-29 hours per week)	Attending school (full-time)	Volunteering (regularly)	Engaged in paid work (less than 10 hours per week)	Attending school (part-time)	Engaged in paid work (10-19 hours per week)	Transitioning to retirement (gradually reducing work hours)
Employed	8,763	3,954	3,441	646	1,994	1,031	916	609	240
Student	200	64	308	2,274	367	281	311	229	25
Independent contractor, freelancer, or self-employed	1,366	876	1,085	232	641	468	256	407	324
Not employed	939	209	67	114	227	115	111	57	44
Retired	260	75	20	11	190	34	17	20	80

	Respondents	Percent
United States of America	4,755	22.3%
Germany	1,983	9.3%
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland	1,374	6.4%
India	1,309	6.1%
Canada	851	4.0%
France	794	3.7%
Netherlands	577	2.7%
Poland	527	2.5%
Australia	522	2.4%
Ukraine	484	2.3%

	Respondents	Percent
Remote	8,564	34.8%
Hybrid (some remote, leans heavy to in-person)	4,883	19.9%
In-person	4,335	17.6%
Hybrid (some in-person, leans heavy to flexibility)	3,823	15.5%
Your choice (very flexible, you can come in when you want or just as needed)	2,997	12.2%

	Respondents	Percent
Software development	3,785	20.0%
IT services, consulting, systems integration, or managed services	2,914	15.4%
Other, please specify	1,344	7.1%
Banking/financial services	1,126	6.0%
Healthcare	955	5.1%
Retail, e-commerce, or consumer services	952	5.0%
Fintech	853	4.5%
Education	796	4.2%
Engineering services or applied R&D	749	4.0%
Manufacturing	749	4.0%
Government	734	3.9%
Scientific research	570	3.0%
Media or advertising services	542	2.9%
Utilities, internet, or telecommunications	542	2.9%
Transportation or supply chain	485	2.6%
Energy	410	2.2%
Insurance	294	1.6%
Hospitality or travel	226	1.2%
Non-profit or social services	209	1.1%
Agriculture, forestry, fishing, and hunting	207	1.1%
Life sciences or biotechnology	173	0.9%
Mining or construction	153	0.8%
Broadcasting or publishing	141	0.8%

1.2 Role functions

IC or PM

81% identify as individual contributors, including 30% senior/staff ICs. Only 3% are exclusively people managers.

Question

Are you an individual contributor or people manager?

	Respondents	Percent
Individual contributor	12,568	50.8%
Individual contributor in a senior or staff-level role	7,517	30.4%
Both people manager and individual contributor	3,828	15.5%
People manager	836	3.4%

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Years coding

38% have coded for at least 20 years, and 17% for 30+ years. This is a highly experienced coding population.

Question

Including any education, how many years have you been coding in total? Please round to the nearest whole number, excluding any decimal points.

	Respondents	Percent
0-4 years	2,467	9.8%
5-9 years	5,021	19.9%
10-14 years	4,821	19.1%
15-19 years	3,432	13.6%
20-29 years	5,128	20.3%
30-39 years	2,512	10.0%
40+ years	1,823	7.2%

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Years of work experience

Question

How many years have you been working professionally in total? Please round to the nearest whole number, excluding any decimal points. If you have no professional work experience, you can leave this question unanswered.

	Respondents	Percent
0-4 years	5,612	22.8%
5-9 years	4,519	18.4%
10-14 years	4,268	17.3%
15-19 years	3,030	12.3%
20-29 years	4,296	17.5%
30-39 years	1,929	7.8%
40+ years	953	3.9%

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	Respondents	Percent
Developer, full-stack	7,042	27.3%
Developer, back-end	3,473	13.5%
Student	1,823	7.1%
Architect, software or solutions	1,792	7.0%
Developer, desktop or enterprise applications	1,030	4.0%
Developer, front-end	933	3.6%
Developer, embedded applications or devices	731	2.8%
Academic researcher	705	2.7%
Developer, mobile	685	2.7%
Engineering manager	603	2.3%
Other	545	2.1%
DevOps engineer or professional	527	2.0%
AI/ML engineer	455	1.8%
Data engineer	426	1.7%
Senior executive (C-suite, VP, etc.)	374	1.5%
Founder or entrepreneur	350	1.4%
Retired	330	1.3%
Developer, game or graphics	316	1.2%
Data scientist	301	1.2%
System administrator	299	1.2%
Data or business analyst	254	1.0%
Solutions engineer, implementation engineer, or forward-deployed engineer	244	0.9%
Cybersecurity or InfoSec professional	228	0.9%
Software engineer	219	0.8%
Cloud infrastructure engineer	218	0.8%
Developer, QA or test	203	0.8%
Developer, AI apps or physical AI	200	0.8%
Applied scientist	183	0.7%
Educator or instructor	175	0.7%
Project manager	158	0.6%
Product manager	149	0.6%
Hardware engineer	145	0.6%
Support engineer or analyst	123	0.5%
Site reliability engineer	119	0.5%
UX, research, or UI design professional	97	0.4%
Database administrator or engineer	94	0.4%
Developer advocate or developer relations professional	61	0.2%
Financial analyst or engineer	45	0.2%
Technical writer or documentation professional	41	0.2%
Platform engineer	37	0.1%
Marketing/Sales professional	34	0.1%

	Respondents	Percent
Writing, editing, or generating code	22,221	89.9%
Debugging or troubleshooting	20,573	83.2%
Reviewing code, pull requests, or technical changes	16,494	66.7%
Making technical design or architecture decisions	15,679	63.4%
Answering questions from teammates, customers, users, or stakeholders	14,754	59.7%
Planning, scoping, or estimating work	14,202	57.5%
Writing or updating documentation	13,918	56.3%
Deploying or releasing software	12,800	51.8%
Writing or maintaining tests	12,618	51.1%
Changing production code, systems, or infrastructure	12,334	49.9%
Investigating an incident, outage, or production issue	11,486	46.5%
Monitoring systems, logs, metrics, or alerts	10,955	44.3%
Maintaining dependencies, packages, or development environments	9,720	39.3%
Coordinating work across teams or functions	7,974	32.3%
Finding or fixing security, privacy, or compliance issues	7,754	31.4%
Onboarding to a new project, tool, system, or codebase	5,732	23.2%
Analyzing data, reports, or business metrics	5,722	23.2%
None of the above	834	3.4%

1.3 Employer + technology details

	Respondents	Percent
10,000 or more employees	2,941	13.9%
5,000 to 9,999 employees	1,017	4.8%
1,000 to 4,999 employees	2,409	11.4%
500 to 999 employees	1,307	6.2%
100 to 499 employees	3,474	16.5%
20 to 99 employees	3,677	17.4%
Less than 20 employees	3,555	16.8%
Just me - I am a freelancer, sole proprietor, etc.	2,213	10.5%
I don’t know	522	2.5%

Tech budget status

Budget increases outnumber budget decreases 23% to 17%. However, 32% do not know their department’s budget direction.

Question

Has your department's budget increased, decreased, or stayed the same in your most recent budget cycle? When considering your department, refer to the one you are working in today.

	Respondents	Percent
I don't know	6,757	32.3%
Stayed the same	5,839	27.9%
Increased	4,713	22.5%
Decreased	3,606	17.2%

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Relationship to purchase decisions at work

59% influence requirements and 48% evaluate tools, but only 18% make final purchase decisions.

	Respondents	Percent
I influence tool choices by giving feedback or requirements	11,916	59.5%
I evaluate, recommend, or shortlist tools	9,664	48.2%
I use tools selected by others	9,131	45.6%
I make the final decision to purchase tools	3,552	17.7%
I do not have a role in choosing or using software tools at my organization	3,320	16.6%
I approve or manage budget for tools	1,867	9.3%

Reasons to endorse a technology

Reliability is the leading recommendation driver at 17%, followed by productivity at 16%. AI features motivate only 2.3%, below community, developer experience, flexibility, trust, and documentation.

	Respondents	Percent
It is reliable, performant, and stable	3,874	17.3%
It helps me be more productive or save time	3,563	15.9%
It has a strong community, ecosystem, or open-source presence	2,888	12.9%
It has a strong developer experience, such as APIs, SDKs, tooling, or integrations	2,541	11.4%
It is flexible, customizable, or easy to adapt to my needs	1,678	7.5%
It has a reputation for quality and long-term trustworthiness	1,666	7.5%
It has excellent documentation, examples, or learning resources	1,370	6.1%
It is easy to learn and use	1,226	5.5%
I’m not sure	1,223	5.5%
Other, please specify	632	2.8%
It has useful AI features or agent capabilities	505	2.3%
It has strong security, privacy, or compliance features	423	1.9%
It has manageable cost, pricing, or licensing	421	1.9%
I would not recommend any technology I use	361	1.6%

	Respondents	Percent
5	2,550	17.2%
10	2,389	16.1%
3	1,427	9.6%
4	1,263	8.5%
6	1,135	7.7%
8	910	6.1%
7	775	5.2%
20	708	4.8%
2	687	4.6%
15	646	4.4%
12	501	3.4%
1	275	1.9%
9	265	1.8%
30	191	1.3%
0	153	1.0%
25	135	0.9%
11	114	0.8%
50	89	0.6%
13	85	0.6%
14	77	0.5%
16	58	0.4%
40	42	0.3%
100	41	0.3%
17	35	0.2%
18	35	0.2%

1.4 Job satisfaction + AI

Job satisfaction

Just 22% are classified as happy, while 33% are unhappy and 45% are complacent

Question

How satisfied are you in your current professional role?

	Respondents	Percent
Complacent at Work	8,516	45.1%
Not Happy at Work	6,161	32.6%
Happy at Work	4,199	22.2%

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Reasons to be "just okay" with current job

	Respondents	Percent
I do not feel complacent	2,889	34.8%
Burnout/tech fatigue	1,753	21.1%
Economic uncertainty making me hesitant to switch roles	1,545	18.6%
AI automating the challenging parts of my job	822	9.9%
Lack of upward mobility due to corporate tightening	811	9.8%
Other	492	5.9%

	Respondents	Percent
Nothing has made my job easier in the past 6 months	3,902	21.1%
Access to the right tools or platforms	3,714	20.1%
Supportive teammates, managers, or mentors	3,191	17.2%
Clear priorities or requirements	1,314	7.1%
Better processes, workflows, or coordination	1,256	6.8%
I’m not sure	1,107	6.0%
Enough time, staffing, or resources	1,088	5.9%
Other	1,044	5.6%
Helpful documentation or knowledge sharing	768	4.1%
Reliable systems, infrastructure, or environments	741	4.0%
Leadership activity or organizational changes	396	2.1%

AI is tightly associated with tool access: 68% say it was the main reason tools made work easier, and another 26% say it contributed. AI is much less likely to be the main reason supportive teams or clear priorities helped.

Question

For each factor that made your job easier, was AI or AI agents a reason?

+ 1 more

	Yes, AI or AI agents were the main reason	No, AI or AI agents were not a reason	Yes, AI or AI agents contributed, but were not the main reason	I’m not sure
Access to the right tools or platforms	2,493	213	968	14
Supportive teammates, managers, or mentors	147	2,113	847	57
Clear priorities or requirements	73	840	369	25
Enough time, staffing, or resources	117	558	374	29
Better processes, workflows, or coordination	242	475	508	17
Reliable systems, infrastructure, or environments	124	349	250	12
Helpful documentation or knowledge sharing	119	314	313	13

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Reasons your job is difficult

In the past 6 months, work was made difficult mostly by unclear priorities (17%), inefficient processes (15%), and lack of time (14%). A unifying thread among these factors is systemic operational friction.

Question

In the past 6 months, which factor has done the most to make your job harder to do?

	Respondents	Percent
Unclear priorities or requirements	3,029	16.6%
Inefficient processes, workflows, or coordination	2,658	14.6%
Not enough time, staffing, or resources	2,566	14.1%
Leadership activity or organizational changes	2,162	11.9%
Nothing has made my job harder in the past 6 months	1,743	9.6%
Unreliable systems, infrastructure, or environments	1,523	8.4%
Poor documentation or knowledge sharing	1,292	7.1%
Other	1,108	6.1%
I’m not sure	865	4.7%
Lack of support from teammates, managers, or mentors	761	4.2%
Lack of access to the right tools or platforms	507	2.8%

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Does AI make your job more difficult?

For each of the top two reasons users find their job difficult, unclear priorities and inefficient processes, 69% say AI was not involved.

Question

For each factor that made your job harder, was AI or AI agents a reason?

+ 1 more

	No, AI or AI agents were not a reason	Yes, AI or AI agents contributed, but were not the main reason	Yes, AI or AI agents were the main reason	I’m not sure
Unclear priorities or requirements	2,084	597	202	126
Inefficient processes, workflows, or coordination	1,812	560	205	61
Not enough time, staffing, or resources	1,753	511	192	98
Poor documentation or knowledge sharing	869	229	123	62
Unreliable systems, infrastructure, or environments	832	344	253	85
Lack of support from teammates, managers, or mentors	517	143	62	27
Lack of access to the right tools or platforms	282	109	90	18

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1.5 Compensation

Compensation by role, and top responding countries

Question

What is your current total annual compensation (salary, bonuses, and perks, before taxes and deductions)? Please enter a whole number in the box below, without any punctuation. If you are paid hourly, please estimate an equivalent yearly salary. If you prefer not to answer, please leave the box empty.

	Respondents	Median salary
Engineering manager	378	$133,263
Senior executive (C-suite, VP, etc.)	176	$131,498
Cloud infrastructure engineer	129	$110,000
Architect, software or solutions	1,023	$102,355
Solutions engineer, implementation engineer, or forward-deployed engineer	144	$101,710
Software engineer	105	$101,218
AI/ML engineer	194	$95,337
Founder or entrepreneur	111	$94,012
Data scientist	155	$90,982
Data engineer	233	$90,000
Developer, back-end	1,922	$85,296
Developer, embedded applications or devices	412	$85,296
DevOps engineer or professional	307	$85,096
Developer, mobile	346	$84,277
Developer, desktop or enterprise applications	559	$80,000
Developer, full-stack	3,761	$79,610
Developer, game or graphics	108	$77,002
Developer, front-end	441	$70,320
Data or business analyst	119	$67,161
Academic researcher	253	$61,413
System administrator	122	$55,230
Other	106	$51,000

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Compensation by experience

Question

+ 1 more

	Respondents	Median salary	Years of experience
Engineering manager	378	$133,263	18.5
Senior executive (C-suite, VP, etc.)	176	$131,498	21.9
Cloud infrastructure engineer	129	$110,000	16.2
Architect, software or solutions	1,023	$102,355	20.1
Solutions engineer, implementation engineer, or forward-deployed engineer	144	$101,710	17.2
Software engineer	105	$101,218	15.2
AI/ML engineer	194	$95,337	12.1
Founder or entrepreneur	111	$94,012	18.5
Data scientist	155	$90,982	13
Data engineer	233	$90,000	15.4
Developer, back-end	1,922	$85,296	14.5
Developer, embedded applications or devices	412	$85,296	14.5
DevOps engineer or professional	307	$85,096	14.2
Developer, mobile	346	$84,277	14.2
Developer, desktop or enterprise applications	559	$80,000	16.7
Developer, full-stack	3,761	$79,610	13.9
Developer, game or graphics	108	$77,002	12.4
Developer, front-end	441	$70,320	11.8
Data or business analyst	119	$67,161	14.6
Academic researcher	253	$61,413	12.6
System administrator	122	$55,230	14.5
Other	106	$51,000	15.7

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Compensation by experience

Question

+ 1 more

	Respondents	Median salary	Years of experience
United States of America	2,885	$154,000	17.4
Switzerland	229	$139,262	14.7
Australia	306	$104,550	17.9
Denmark	123	$104,214	14.2
Norway	110	$103,004	15.5
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland	855	$96,333	17.8
Canada	539	$94,315	16.7
Germany	1,218	$85,296	14.2
Austria	163	$84,912	13.4
Netherlands	360	$82,453	15.1
New Zealand	107	$80,858	19.9
Belgium	117	$74,964	13.8
Sweden	241	$71,965	16.6
Spain	331	$68,237	16.1
Poland	309	$65,733	12.7
France	526	$62,550	13.5
Portugal	135	$61,413	12.7
Czech Republic	158	$56,438	13
Italy	302	$47,766	15.7
Brazil	244	$36,002	15.5
Ukraine	259	$35,800	10.2
India	472	$18,802	8.8

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