Developers experience burnout, but 70% of them code on weekends

Almost three-quarters or, more precisely, 73% of developers have experienced burnout, according to Jet Brains’ report, The State of Developer Ecosystem 2023. The report summarizes insights on developers’ preferred languages and technologies, methodologies, and lifestyles gathered from 26,348 developers from all around the globe.

As the rest of the findings align with the industry trends – 84% of developers are familiar with and use generative AI tools, JavaScript is the most used language; let’s dig deeper into the less often analyzed data on developers, the lifestyle ones.

Developer burnout is real

As mentioned, 73% of surveyed developers have experienced some burnout in their careers (read more on developer burnout and how to avoid it). As expected, those who have experienced burnout feel tired more often, and 51% of them use some kind of self-monitoring app or device to track their health data.

Developers who have experienced burnout say that their daily productivity is boosted by factors connected with mental health, self-organization, and time management. On the other hand, those who haven’t experienced burnout point to factors such as tools or organizations of work processes.

Quitting courses, learning through docs and APIs

Another rather unexpected statistic involving three-quarters of developers answers the question of whether they have ever quit a learning program or a course. And 75% of respondents said they had.

The reason? Only a minority of developers like learning new tools, technologies, and languages through courses. Instead, they prefer documentation and APIs ( 67%) or blogs and forums (53%). When it comes to the type of content they prefer for learning, 53% prefer written content and 45% video. As expected, video content is preferred by respondents aged 21-19.

When asked how much time they spend on learning weekly, 41% of developers said it’s 3 to 8 hours, and 30% of them said it’s one to two hours.

What do devs want? Good hours and good pay

Good hours, good pay, and the feeling that they can achieve something are by far the most important factors of job satisfaction for 70% of developers.

Pay raises, appreciation from colleagues, seeing that one’s work makes a difference, and enjoying the work itself are respondents’ top reasons to feel productive. Some said that upgrades in hardware, tooling, or learning how to use their tools better would make them feel more productive. Still, the most important factors of developers’ satisfaction have to do with people and organization more than with technology.

When asked about their daily routines, 68% of developers answered they start their work day by opening work-related chats. Also, 70 % of developers said they code for fun on weekends.