The most popular version of Java, remote work and video games: what the 2021 JetBrains study says

JetBrains, a developer of tools for Java and other languages, conducted an annual study. More than 47 thousand people from 183 countries took part in the 2021 Developer Ecosystem Survey. In particular, during the study, IT specialists from 17 countries were interviewed, which account for approximately 70% of all developers in the world: Argentina, Belarus, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Japan, Mexico, Russia, South Korea, Spain , Turkey, Ukraine, UK and USA. We have collected the key findings of the study - about the Java language, the work and lifestyle of programmers.

Java in 2021: popular in South Korea, China and Germany

One of the main conclusions of the study is that the Java programming language, although losing ground slightly, is still more popular than Python as the main language (32% versus 29% of respondents). JavaScript was the most popular language in 2021, with 69% of respondents using it in the last 12 months and 39% naming it as their primary programming language. As in 2020, Java is most commonly used in South Korea, China, and Germany. Java's share in South Korea is 55%, in China - 47%, and in Germany - 33%. In Belarus, 26% of developers prefer Java, in Ukraine - 20%, in Russia - 18%. This is slightly less than in 2020.

Which version of Java is the most popular?

As in 2020, Java 8 is still the leading version of this programming language. It is also interesting that since 2019, Java 11 has shown steady growth of about 10 percentage points annually. In numbers, it looks like this: 72% of developers who use Java prefer Java 8, and 42% prefer Java 11. The shares of Java 12 and Java 13 have decreased by about three times since 2020, while the newer Java 14 and Java 15 has already gained an audience despite being relatively new.

Which frameworks do you choose?

The share of developers using Spring Boot grew slightly in 2021, by about 4 percentage points (65% of programmers choose it). The Spring MVC framework is in second place with 42% of developers. At the same time, a small portion of developers are using many more new web frameworks than in 2020.

Application servers: Apache Tomcat and Jetty

The application server landscape in 2021 is roughly the same as in 2020, with Apache Tomcat still the most popular among developers, used by 61% of programmers.

What is Java most often used for?

Most often, Java is used to develop websites (39%), less often - to create utilities (26%) and system software (19%). Java usage for websites and IT infrastructure has grown marginally between 2020 and 2021, while Java has seen less use for business analytics, data science, and machine learning.

Portrait of a developer: more women are entering the industry

63% of developers work full-time, 15% study at universities, 7% also study but work, 5% freelance. 81% of respondents work as a programmer, 15% as a team lead, 13% as a DevOps engineer, 12% as an architect. Most programmers work in companies where there are fewer developers than specialists in other areas. Another noteworthy finding is that most often developers work in companies with no more than 50 people (80% of respondents responded this way). If we talk about IT companies, programmers most often work with IT services (40%), mobile development (24%), cloud platforms and data (17% each). Among companies from other areas, IT specialists most often work in banking and finance (18%), sales and education (12% each). The majority of developers are men (93%) aged 21 to 29 (48%). However, more and more women are entering the tech industry. They often work with data analysis and machine learning, UX/UI design. Far fewer women work in programming and systems administration. The largest percentage of programmers are in South Korea (13%), Belarus (12%) and Canada (8%). In Russia, in the general field of developers, only 7% are programmers, and in Ukraine - 6%.

Developer lifestyle: wake-up time and remote work

The time at which developers usually start their workday has not changed since last year: programmers stuck to their work schedule even during the pandemic. 83% of developers start their workday before 10 am. If before the pandemic about 70% of developers worked from the office, now 80% work from home. Interestingly, while the share of developers working in cafes has halved during the pandemic, the number of people working in coworking spaces hasn't changed much. This year, a variety of events have become much more accessible thanks to the widespread use of online formats. In 2020, about 75% of developers attended online conferences, and more than 40% of respondents attended online seminars and meetups. While the vast majority of developers have a GitHub account, slightly less than half have a profile on Stack Overflow. The three most commonly used social media platforms are Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.

Developer Hobbies: Video Games Outpace Coding

In 2020, most developers named programming as their biggest hobby. This year, video games top the list, with their popularity rising from 49% to 59%. The personal computer is the most popular gaming platform, with consoles taking second place. Among them, PlayStation and Nintendo Switch are the most widely used. The second most popular hobby is programming (57%), followed by listening to music (40%). More than half of the respondents are involved in charity work. The most popular reason for giving to charity is to make the world and community a better place to live. Most developers want to help children, care about the environment, fight social inequality or help the disadvantaged. These are the findings of the 2021 Development Ecosystem Study. Which of these findings apply to you? Which ones do you disagree with? We invite you to discuss this in the comments below the text.