53 Statistics About Software Developers

The IT industry is experiencing rapid growth, with an enormous demand from businesses for programming products and services. Consequently, companies face increasing pressure to recruit skilled developers.

By 2024, it is projected there will be 28.7 million programmers worldwide, up from 23.9 million in 2019. The developer population has grown by approximately 600,000 between 2019 and 2021.

The typical software developer profile shows a young demographic. Over 32% of developers fall within the 25-34 age range, while 27% are under 24 years old. Only 11.1% exceed age 45. In terms of gender, approximately 20% of computer programmers in the United States are women, with similar percentages globally.

More than half of all programmers reside in just 10 major cities across America, Europe, and Asia. The United States accounts for 18.33% of the global developer population.

Regarding skill development, over 65.6% of developers are self-taught. About 59.53% utilize online resources for learning, while 40.39% pursue formal online courses or certifications. Notably, 53.59% obtained foundational knowledge through school education.

Nearly half (49.47%) identify as full-stack developers, with 43.73% working as backend developers and 27.42% as frontend developers. JavaScript remains the most popular language at 61%, followed by Python at 42.2% and Java at 35.8%.

For employment, 59.4% of developers possess less than five years of experience. The median salary in the United States reaches $89,190 annually, while European cities like Munich offer approximately 70,000 EUR per year.