Communications of the ACM
Which Coding Skills Are Most In-Demand and Who's Hiring For Them?
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Coding Dojo has released a list of the most in-demand programming languages by U.S. city. As part of its research, Coding Dojo also identified the company with the most job listings for the top language in each city.
Coding Dojo's findings are meant to help experienced developers or new students determine the best programming language to learn based on where they live and the companies they want to work for. A programming language is a set of commands, instructions, and syntax used to create software programs.
"At Coding Dojo we're always revising our curriculum to prepare our students for the rapidly changing technology job market," says Michael Choi, CEO at Coding Dojo, a coding school. "This analysis shows that the demand for coding skills is local, and knowing a language that will help you get a job in San Jose may not get you hired in Washington D.C."
The top programming languages by city (and the corresponding company advertising the most job openings for the top language in each market) are:
- New York
- JavaScript / MEAN Stack (Bloomberg)
- Java
- Python
- C#
- Swift / iOS
- Los Angeles
- Python (SpaceX)
- Java
- JavaScript / MEAN Stack
- C#
- PHP
- Chicago
- Python (Google)
- Java
- JavaScript / MEAN Stack
- C#
- PHP
- Philadelphia
- Java (Lockheed Martin)
- JavaScript / MEAN Stack
- Python
- C#
- Swift / iOS
- Dallas
- Python (Capital One)
- Java
- JavaScript / MEAN Stack
- C#
- PHP
- San Jose
- Python (Apple)
- Java
- JavaScript / MEAN Stack
- Swift / iOS
- Ruby on Rails
- Washington, D.C.
- Python (Amazon, and Capital One)
- Java
- JavaScript / MEAN Stack
- C#
- PHP
- Houston
- JavaScript / MEAN stack (JP Morgan Chase)
- Java
- Python
- C#
- PHP
- Boston
- Python (Akamai)
- Java
- JavaScript / MEAN Stack
- C#
- PHP
- Atlanta
- Python (Home Depot)
- Java
- JavaScript / MEAN Stack
- Ruby on Rails
- C#
- Seattle
- Python (Amazon)
- Java
- JavaScript / MEAN Stack
- C#
- Swift / iOS
Other Findings
- Java, JavaScript/MEAN Stack, and Python were in high demand across all locations.
- Ruby on Rails broke into the top five in only two locations: San Jose and Atlanta, indicating moderate demand at best. Yet it is perceived as popular and taught in almost all coding bootcamps.
- Among coding bootcamps, C# and Java tend to be under-taught when compared to the high level of job demand for both these languages.
- San Jose was the only location where C# did not rank in the top five languages, likely because of Apple's presence there. C# was developed by Microsoft and used heavily in its software.
"This data backs up much of what we've known anecdotally in the developer community for years, like the lukewarm job demand for developer favorite language Ruby on Rails and just how high of a demand there is for Java," says Speros Misirlakis, head of curriculum at Coding Dojo. "It's a good reminder that the technology developers like and talk about are not necessarily the same ones that businesses use. Based on this research, we're removing Ruby on Rails and Swift classes from some of our locations and adding Java, C#, and PHP to others to better prepare our students for careers in those job markets."
Language Overview
- C# was developed by Microsoft and is heavily used in Microsoft enterprise software, as well as by Starbucks and Stack Overflow.
- PHP is a server-side programming language used by 80 percent of websites worldwide.
- Java is an extremely popular and versatile programming language used in Android apps and server-side development by 90 percent of Fortune 500 companies.
- JavaScript is primarily a front-end web development language (it's used to describe how websites look and behave on screen) used in some way by 90 percent of web pages and almost all major companies. The MEAN Stack (an acronym for MongoDB, Express.js, AngularJS, and Node.js) is a collection of technologies based on JavaScript used together to create web applications.
- Python is a general-purpose, open-source programming language used by Reddit, Instagram, Venmo, and others on the server side (meaning it describes how a server handles requests from devices or websites), as well as for scripting, data analysis, and data science.
- Ruby on Rails is a combination of a programming language (Ruby) and a web application framework (Rails) designed for ease of use. Groupon, Twitter, and Hulu use Ruby on Rails.
- Swift was launched by Apple in 2014. It is also used by Zillow and Lyft, and is popular with startups and mobile app developers.
Methodology
Coding Dojo calculated these rankings by adding up the number of job postings mentioning coding languages on employment websites Dice.com and Indeed.com, taking the average monthly Google search volume for keywords related to coding languages, and with interviews of Coding Dojo instructors about student demand for each language.
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