12 months ago Syntax Podcast
State of Devs 2025 Results
Transcript
Scott Tolinski
developer ninja at some point. You know? Like, that's what when I started in the industry, job titles were all like, we need a web dev wizard. My first job title as a developer was an interactive producer, So forty four percent of us fall into this 30 39 year old, and I say us because I fall into this right here, unless I believe you do too because I think you're younger than me by it. Lisa I am I'm just asking chat g chat g p t how old I am, because I never know how old I am. I'm that old.
Wes Bos
by income
Scott Tolinski
like, go for walks and all that stuff. To me, that helps my brain decongest, my first dev job, I made 36.
Scott Tolinski
Oh. My own stuff. My yeah. Mine is because of concussion.
Scott Tolinski
Figure out your sleep. Something lighter here. Hobbies.
Scott Tolinski
you can apply for jobs,
Wes Bos
like, comp and all the Yarn, and if you get part of the company. Yeah. Well Yeah. Location regular users want the all holy algorithm that will shovel them the
Scott Tolinski
thing. Because Yes. 83% in Colorado
Wes Bos
is over twice the over twice the salary.
Wes Bos
and I don't wanna have to do any of the small talk or whatever. I do like the ability to roll over to someone's desk
Scott Tolinski
Previous surveys. It looks like a lot of people have done previous surveys. 72% of people gave no answer for this. The source, state of devs. Hey. Josh Komu. He's on Blue Sky. So, for the most part. Movies I'll actually see on this list, I will see Anora.
Wes Bos
Maybe just obviously, nobody
Scott Tolinski
Why are you doing this to me? I don't know anything of its answers. Puts in the most hours? And Yeah. The fiftieth percentile JS, like, a 120,000, Century office and and beyond. So I've been lifting myself since, like, 2015, which is how I got so muscular and and handsome.
Wes Bos
I, I've been trying the standing thing, and I I tweeted about it. And people had some pretty good tips on on how to get better. I just cannot
Scott Tolinski
7%
Wes Bos
It's kinda just oh, that's what I was gonna say really quickly is that I'm trying the standing thing again.
Scott Tolinski
But, yeah, I I was surprised by full full or even, like, technical lead chart, front end engineer.
Scott Tolinski
across the board in terms of percentages. There's like like you said, the outlier Brazil only, like, makes sense when you look at there's only a 120 respondents.
Wes Bos
Imagine Dragons is like dad rock.
Scott Tolinski
So very happy. Where if you compare that to remote work is Right? But I'll run my mouth about it. Yes. So that that's that's kinda my situation as well. If I, yeah, if I can't if I can't provide actual help, I'm not talking, trash. Yeah. Thirty one percent have financially re supported open source projects, This is a ESLint interesting, but at the same regard, it does look pretty even It's not I don't know. Just because there's the most amount of respondents in The USA.
Wes Bos
Why is there no answer for this one? You could can't you tell what browser people are using? I don't know. 36%
Scott Tolinski
I have a job title now. My my job title What is it? Is executive physical activity. Well, people just don't call it the hobby.
Scott Tolinski
Dad rock for sure. I I cannot imagine rock. Responding Imagine Dragons to a survey like this.
Scott Tolinski
If you all have Oh, we've got some of those too. Yeah. Man, I'll just devalue these. These are great for the airplane.
Wes Bos
Yeah. I guess I'm surprised to to see how high the strength training is. 36% I didn't. It really It's like a family base camp that I set up. We're way more, especially for, like, obviously, a very heavy web development audience that this survey has. 8% are are slinging a little bit of Rust.
Scott Tolinski
Syntax FM on YouTube.
Scott Tolinski
Where's the The Last of Us? Yeah. I I would rather play the video game. I don't need to see a TV show of that. Yeah. Put a TV on my watch. I don't know. Top Chef, I I think that's not, like, ideal number, but that's a high number from generally what you Node, you're relying on people to open up their wallets or companies to open up their wallets.
Wes Bos
office culture.
Scott Tolinski
not super pretty.
Scott Tolinski
Radiohead, I love Radiohead.
Scott Tolinski
I don't know, mid mid twenty Oh my god.
Scott Tolinski
They're perfectly airplane snack. I'm just gonna Assistant. Bear back a couple of them.
Wes Bos
up to the employee. So you can go into the office or you can go remote. So if you were surprising to me. Up to the employee, of people using macOS, 28 on Windows, 15
Scott Tolinski
It is interesting, though.
Scott Tolinski
So that sincerely worked.
Scott Tolinski
And then I got a substantial bump in my third job. And
Wes Bos
No. I I agree. I think Android is is really cool. I would love to be able to switch to it. I'm just I'm just too far in. I'm too far in. But I don't know. We're seeing a we're seeing a wave of people move off the Mac lately.
Wes Bos
company?
Scott Tolinski
Chat GPT says Scott Tolinski is 38 year old years old because he refers to himself as having entered the advanced age of 38.
Scott Tolinski
out there. Now granted, there's a lot of us that are. So some of you might not, you know, understand the the range here, but that to me is one of the big big things I see. You Node, five to nine years is when it starts to open up where people are making 6 figures getting into $114,000.
Scott Tolinski
I'd put Japan as one of the lowest.
Scott Tolinski
The people who would respond bash on the survey. Yeah. That is true. Type of person.
Scott Tolinski
So I think we're stuck here. Programming languages, number 83%
Wes Bos
Oh, no. But it does say that Zero. I'm unemployable snowball sampling, daily Deno.
Scott Tolinski
You know what? Rust, 8%. I'm surprised it's that many folks. Honestly, I you know, Rust has had a hype moment, but, like, how many people are really using Rust day to day? That's
Wes Bos
That's a lot, which is great. A lot of us I would say that's that's good as well. Like, that's Yeah. A significant half of the people that took the survey
Scott Tolinski
for income of all respondents is $30,000 Because most people averages fiftieth percentile JS 40 across the board. So it's not really like there's a ton of variation here. I do wanna highlight real quick on workplace perks. The number one most responded thing is relationships. Oh, good relationships with coworkers. I thought that just said relationships with coworkers. I was like, We went to Hawaii. I did have like, this was a kid's vacation we had planned for a long time. I did have twitches on the vacation. I've had twitches since we've come back, but you know what? I had no twitches yesterday. I had no twitches today so Yarn. And
Wes Bos
but I've never seen that as a call myself. That's interesting. If if when people ask me what to write on, like, a conference badge
Scott Tolinski
bump in my second job.
Wes Bos
Not really. I always just say
Scott Tolinski
Oh, that's so funny. What a perk.
Scott Tolinski
per year.
Scott Tolinski
That concussion took a massive toll on me. I had a ton of major issues from it. I was averaging about two hours of sleep a night for about a month and a half, which then turned into kind of a hellish experience of full body muscle twitches. I was averaging
Wes Bos
crashes and someone dies, super high. LinkedIn, super high.
Wes Bos
of respondents
Scott Tolinski
Okay. I've seen five.
Scott Tolinski
From Nature's Garden.
Wes Bos
that most developers were either on Blue Sky or Twitter. Wouldn't wouldn't you?
Scott Tolinski
You're at Deno. Or if if you count how many companies I've worked with, it's probably 10 times. Okay. Well, nobody's counting that. How many companies you worked for? How, you ever been salaried, w two'd, at a Zero. Company? the past twelve months.
Wes Bos
and walking, hiking is by far the highest in an unrelated field. Oh, that's neat. You're an unrelated.
Scott Tolinski
what stands out to you at this on this chart? It seems like the tenth percentile I think that's like, paddle paddle. Call it Padel.
Scott Tolinski
have submitted issues or bug reports, which is very funny,
Wes Bos
State of developers who moved into management.
Wes Bos
people group. Yeah. Had that. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Me too. But that's mostly because of children, not because of
Scott Tolinski
Yeah. Alright. Devs, what what phones do they use?
Wes Bos
and Sweden Yeah. On that ESLint, but Instagram,
Scott Tolinski
in a row that I have had since my accident Wes I did not have any singular muscle twitches. Wow. So I was gonna ask you. So that that worked, tens, like, 2015 or something. I don't I didn't even know that people got the because I was just always web I was almost a, Years of experience
Wes Bos
thirty eight? I I thought France
Scott Tolinski
Electronics as a hobby. I I I don't Node. If we're talking about tech here, I don't think you can say electronics are your hobby. Folks, the workplace, hobbies, Chapel Node, not really surprised about that. That album was great. Lady Gaga, I am surprised.
Scott Tolinski
And let me slop through five different things that I don't care about before you give me something that's like, oh, this is kinda interesting. Community contributions.
Scott Tolinski
about
Wes Bos
I would have thought Twitter would be much higher
Scott Tolinski
We're well, maybe they call it football. Yeah. 1% into dancing. Where's my dancing, folks? I'm a dancer. That's what I do for fun. So What is Padel,
Wes Bos
Kinda fun to go through that and see how everything
Scott Tolinski
people 70% use CSS, 69, nice, use HTML.
Wes Bos
it's like me on computer. I'm on computer. That's People like I mean, who are, like, soldering in, like like, ESP 32 microcontrollers.
Wes Bos
salary bump just by quitting one job and starting another, and you probably would not get that $40 salary bump staying at the same company.
Wes Bos
Cool. Hey, Kevin Powell, who joined us on one of our CSS battles. Alright. That's it for today. That is a Scott of devs 2025.
Wes Bos
Cool. Alright. Thanks so much for tuning in, and we will catch you later.
Scott Tolinski
Notion, Asana, ClickUp, man. Okay. Linear. Yeah. A lot of people are using linear, but mostly small companies. 37 signals one that we used years ago. Basecamp, who the responders are. Here's this. The median age of RSS feed users is 40,
Wes Bos
has been laid off just yet in Australia, it in in probably, like, eight, ten years or something like that. When Google Reader Wes shut down, containing engineer
Scott Tolinski
degree that
Wes Bos
Safari.
Scott Tolinski
I I never dang used this. I yeah. I would I would, like, Master sometime before if you'd like or pseudonym or whatever on our potluck form. Just Sanity, Anan, just say mental health, say this is for Courtney, whatever.
Scott Tolinski
And then By percentage. But only a 139 That was part of our deals. I got a fancy job title. So I've I'm an executive producer, So maybe maybe that's in our future as well. I I don't see that happening to me. Yeah.
Scott Tolinski
It's changed.
Wes Bos
now they're the youngins.
Scott Tolinski
I passed all the tests. If I was a football player, they would The brain. Node back in. Your brain is still in there? The brain is still in there. The concussion is not still in there. It's gone. Oh, good. It said it said, see you later.
Wes Bos
one crazy stat is that the average salary difference between job titles
Scott Tolinski
if you can get those big jumps, that's a good opportunity to take those jumps. Now that second job,
Wes Bos
RSS just makes so much sense still, but I just have not
Scott Tolinski
Linkin Park. Taylor ESLint, how is Linkin Park number one? How is Linkin Yarn? This? but I think you you you try to tick pick the opportunity that's going to be the safest long term for you and and have the the greatest value jump. To me, that has always been the thing. If and if I'm moving to this job, what's the likelihood I will get let go? Now one of my big jumps came with a
Wes Bos
the long term of anything here? But Yeah. Yeah. If you go to country, Australia has no layoffs in the last twelve months. How many respondents? 200 respondents? 100. It's
Scott Tolinski
Surprise. Fundamentalheads.
Wes Bos
I don't know that you would be liable. But if you're an engineer
Scott Tolinski
given the context of some of the conversations around the Internet you know, issues or problems at work or with the stuff I'm trying to do. I also like that feedback. So I I do I do wish there was a a Colorado Denver office for me to just stop on in and hang out. And then, like, days I'm recording, stay here or whatever, I I would like that. I don't know why. Yeah. Bad idea. The one thing I don't like is that I can go from I'll tell you what kind of camera,
Wes Bos
And I think that it's partially because of, like, teamwork and whatever, but I do think it's that a lot of people are just dicking off at Node. And, like, doing laundry and stuff. Wes do you what do you think? Yeah. I don't wanna, like, I don't wanna throw shade on remote work. I remote work remotely.
Wes Bos
a a hobby for a lot of people who get into web development. There's a high correlation between people who build,
Scott Tolinski
I didn't really like the second job. So even though I got a good bump from it, I didn't really like the job. So that's why Yeah. The third job was really great. Got another bump there. But that was my last
Wes Bos
supporting of I'm not not not gonna make you do that.
Wes Bos
Israel JS also up there. Canada,
Scott Tolinski
from my typical location, Chrome. 14%
Wes Bos
But I also I don't like
Scott Tolinski
just go to blogs. I was just typing in csstricks.com.
Scott Tolinski
And The Office, obviously, everyone's seen The Office. Yeah. Seen all three of those. And then I also saw an episode of Black Mirror, and then I did watch Severance for the first season. I've not put on the second season.
Wes Bos
would that deter
Scott Tolinski
It's small dosage, not what you would take as an antidepressant.
Scott Tolinski
Let's not myself lately.
Wes Bos
That's probably what that is. Yeah. No. I get that. Or people who are, like, into Discmans.
Scott Tolinski
And I I had gotten raises here and there, whatever, but the big, big jumps always came from finding a new job.
Scott Tolinski
I don't know.
Wes Bos
used
Scott Tolinski
working in tech because would you go into the office ever if the office was easy to get to? Hybrid
Wes Bos
Alright. I did my count. What are you at? Four.
Scott Tolinski
I had the card in my back pocket of level up tutorials to be like, you know what? I really wanna do level up tutorials full time, and the salary bump is going to give me a nice runway to be able to pursue that. So if, let's say, the project does end, I then get to pursue my project full time, and that's actually ended up what happening. So there's that. There's a lot of factors here beyond just jumping jobs. But every every job jump I had, I I think I I Node the right choice.
Scott Tolinski
just be prepared that this product or project could fizzle out. And that was a conversation we really had to have. Like, I just think being around people in general enough,
Wes Bos
But in Canada, that that term of engineer is, like, a legally binding one. And the I don't know if this happens in The States, but when you graduate 36%
Scott Tolinski
I've contributed code to open source projects, 48%.
Scott Tolinski
Yeah. I know for me, it's it's I feel like my day is so, like, clustered down with different things. It's like, alright. You finally have an opportunity to grind on some code. It's four to five. I gotta get as much done as possible in this hour. Yearly income,
Wes Bos
like, very well? Yeah. But, like, I mean, like, I would assume on the survey are using Blue Sky than Twitter, and that just goes to show how much Twitter is just nerfing anything No. I got no health issues.
Scott Tolinski
Yarn pass. Hard pass.
Scott Tolinski
a year, where the ninetieth percentile is a $175,000 61% of video games. I've been playing a lot of video games myself. Wes, how about you? things and we're gonna learn a lot about developers use JavaScript, 75% who has never used RSS for anything, really. I've for podcast. That's it. I've never used it for anything. I never really did Google Reader or whatever. No. I had CJ, like, telling me about RSS, and I was just like, Germany high. I don't know.
Scott Tolinski
always came from finding a new job.
Scott Tolinski
And then over thirty years, the fiftieth percentile is thousands
Wes Bos
So, Scott, you have to guess which race gender crossover is the most on Linux. So at a $175,000.50
Scott Tolinski
So 8% of folks during the past twelve months have been laid out. That's 656 That knocked me out
Wes Bos
Yeah.
Wes Bos
Nintendo, but I don't play that very often. You have a 61%,
Scott Tolinski
Obsidian is somewhat high here. I always don't think about Obsidian as being like a, you know, a big big place, strawberry yogis.
Wes Bos
and those containing developer is $44,939.
Wes Bos
on Blue Sky and Twitter, but Twitter just tanks
Scott Tolinski
doing great stuff, finding all your errors and fixing your code for you or helping you fix it yourself. It's the best. Alright.
Scott Tolinski
would like to think.
Wes Bos
56% And France,
Scott Tolinski
So a lot of people think that everybody in tech makes a billion dollars, you know, whatever.
Scott Tolinski
This podcast is sponsored by Costco Yogis.
Scott Tolinski
Android, 53% spend some time on a beach, and I've calmed my nervous system down. I I kid you Node. My doctor asked me to spend time,
Wes Bos
reading.
Scott Tolinski
environment, I took some good time off this summer at the request of of my doctor to calm my nervous system down, What's your race? Vercel button. What's pressing it? I was a music major, folks. I do not play an instrument. I play lots of instruments. I don't play an instrument well, and I can't sing. Pretty much the least talented music major to ever exist. Yeah.
Wes Bos
Music? Where is this? Forty two percent of your Poor sleep will kill you.
Scott Tolinski
I'm surprised some of these are so low. Basketball being so low, I you know, I guess Wes did see the terminal basketball game, and, What what health issues do you have? Did you ever have a salary paying dev job?
Wes Bos
No. It's crazy. It does feel like 22%. It's pretty pretty popular in the dev space as Wes, just getting into strength training. So I'm glad to see that.
Scott Tolinski
respondents use Basecamp.
Scott Tolinski
I'm having a a giggle here. Discmans.
Scott Tolinski
Yeah. I'm not surprised by that the job increases.
Wes Bos
No. No. I never never have. I've always been a a free agent JS you will.
Scott Tolinski
the just happy in general, it seems like massively improved by having the access to remote work or having some hybrid, Yeah. This is this is kinda interesting lead I don't see a single one of these people say What year is this done in?
Wes Bos
average age.
Scott Tolinski
I don't see any reason to make that not make that leap. But if it is like you're changing jobs every six months, that's gonna look bad on your LinkedIn. Sure. But if you plan on getting a job and you know the job security JS there and it is a higher bump and you're just gonna stick there for as long until somebody else comes knocking now I don't even know if this world exists anymore, I am a developer from Denver.
Wes Bos
do strength training.
Wes Bos
or maybe the highest three countries
Scott Tolinski
I'm unrelated. Yes. Music is is not that closely related.
Wes Bos
So this is not it is it's kind of a funny thing JS it's not something when people talk about it or ask me, hey. What can I expect to make? You don't necessarily know a whole lot of of what to talk about. And then you also have to talk about, like
Scott Tolinski
It does show that, like, larger company sizes do, use Jira, obviously, same with Azure.
Wes Bos
no. I'm not I'm not even gonna go there. No chance. No chance.
Scott Tolinski
This is have you ever been laid off? Not like you been laid off and, you're still looking or any of that, which I I think might be a more important like, have you been laid off and you are unable to find a job currently, which is something that I would be interested in. I've never been laid off 69% which is only 42 respondents, but 18% says unhappy, 35% neutral, No. Fantastic. I'm not gonna eat something then.
Scott Tolinski
I wanna take this opportunity to say Yes. We are going to have doctor Courtney Tolinski on the show to talk about like go to a coffee shop, work from someplace different around the house or whatever Yeah. Because it puts my brain in a position of Yeah.
Wes Bos
9PM and get.
Wes Bos
I was like Yeah. Post dinner. I was traversing pnpm AST, like, thirty seconds ago. Give me a sec. I I need that, like, come down. I don't have that come down at all, especially JS like, at the end of the day, I'm always trying to scramble to, like, wrap stuff up before the end of the day. And then if if you don't get it done in time, then you're just like, oh, man. I'm I'm so out of it.
Scott Tolinski
if there was an office and then 41% And I had the As always, the responses to this are income versus which makes makes sense. Hybrid to me makes the most amount of sense.
Scott Tolinski
the slop that they need. Please shovel me my slop today. Yes. Yes. Let me I will tell you folks, happy or 3.7 out of five happy JS average. Three out of five. But if you look at the very unhappy, it's 3% Vercel 11.
Scott Tolinski
removing myself
Wes Bos
Yes. How many people work there that got relationship with coworkers?
Scott Tolinski
35, amongst depends on the role or mostly remote, I I do I do every single time I go to Amsterdam for JS Nation. It's like, man, I really like it here. It's pretty cool. Yeah. Oh, job title. I thought this was interesting what percentage of people have what titles. So 19% of people have software engineer. Okay.
Scott Tolinski
seriously, is the salary bump
Wes Bos
responded. Yeah. That's true. It's maybe not a big enough sample size. 20 folks. Yeah.
Scott Tolinski
Yeah.
Scott Tolinski
working situation,
Wes Bos
One thing to just be able to, like, nail is be able to, like, get good sleep. You know? Like, that seems like such a life hack to figure out how to get really good sleep.
Wes Bos
3.7%
Scott Tolinski
It worked very well. And I'll tell you what. Since then, I think a lot of people just dick around. I and and I think that a lot of people would happily say they dick around and get paid for it and be fine with that. Not, like, massive percentage of people, but, like, yeah. I man, I I I I just know that, like, even in the office, people dick around. So given the opportunity Of the okay. We'll do how many of the top 20 you've seen and how many of the top 20 I've seen.
Scott Tolinski
No.
Wes Bos
Australia, macOS Only 2% Microsoft Edge.
Wes Bos
on
Scott Tolinski
anytime soon because I don't wanna have to go through all that change. Yeah. It makes sense.
Wes Bos
still higher than Android and iOS?
Scott Tolinski
and many of you thought that was it. Now some of you have, like, wondered I may have been, like, video games and video game platforms. Baldur's Gate three, Bellatro. Bellatro, that is a game you do not need to get into, folks. Man, that will suck up your dang time. It's like poker, but the poker rules are all wacky, and you're trying to score points.
Wes Bos
I am
Scott Tolinski
She's very brilliant, and she's just a general. Great. We've had her on the show a couple of times to talk all things like ADHD, and we've had a q and a with her before. I wanna offer this up again. If you have any questions about mental health stuff regardless, somewhere very like, the most relaxing place I could, and we went to a beach.
Scott Tolinski
really great place to work. So always check out their hiring pages, careers pages on their website. Great company, and I gotta say the songs were enjoyable, But there is also a point where
Wes Bos
Video game platform. Oh, wait.
Scott Tolinski
for me, those big jumps Not surprising to me. Android is a great operating system, and I really like it. And anybody who talks crap about it can come talk to me. That said, here's my iPhone. I I used Android for a long time, and I like it a lot. So I I'm not surprised by that. It's it's way better than what some of these, like, code.
Wes Bos
So I am Uh-huh. Like, I find it annoying that people oh, you wanna go for coffee? You wanna have lunch? No. I wanna sit here and dial in and work
Scott Tolinski
I had a a
Wes Bos
users, and the guess the lowest three average incomes. Are the sample sizes large enough?
Scott Tolinski
sunroofs for a living. He has, like, patents and stuff, and he had, like like, window regulator designs. And to me, that's like or worked on window regulators and stuff. To me, that's engineer. When I saw people gain the engineer title, I'm like, my dad engineer. I'm not engineer. My dad is.
Wes Bos
and and or be able to, like, brainstorm. You know? Hey. Let's pop into a room real quick and and talk this through. I think you certainly miss a lot of that, but I don't like all of that. I I do see why a lot of these companies are are pushing people back into
Scott Tolinski
Imagine Dragons.
Scott Tolinski
Oh, okay.
Wes Bos
TikTok and all that stuff, and I have noticed
Scott Tolinski
and seeing, Yes.
Scott Tolinski
producer.
Scott Tolinski
the substance rules, and it made me sick to my stomach. I watched it in VR, and it was, like, too big and crazy.
Scott Tolinski
Tech being Well Google laying off a good chunk of their employees. You know? I think that is absolutely happening, and that absolutely does exist. But there has been other periods in other jobs and even in web dev where there were lots of layoffs. You know? There's ebbs and flows to this stuff. Now who knows all kinds of decisions at Century proper. And I'm like, bro, I make a podcast. I don't know what you're talking about. Yeah.
Scott Tolinski
of full body muscle just twitches all over my body all day long for Pink Floyd. A lot of people as a as development, which It's easy. It's easy on Mac. It's UNIX. Just works. Like, yeah, it just works. You see, everything just works on it. All my apps are here. People were wondering how we could use macOS as developers when Apple is trying to kill the web on mobile phones. And my answer to that is I have used macOS since 02/2003.
Wes Bos
hearing information croquettes all day and drinking coffee and riding their bike to work. Yeah. Stroke waffle. Join it all.
Scott Tolinski
Here with you as always is Syntax. We are presented by Century over at century.io.
Scott Tolinski
use TypeScript,
Wes Bos
of developers using Let's get Scott canceled.
Scott Tolinski
Yes.
Wes Bos
Half of them sports exercise.
Wes Bos
as an engineer in Canada, you get a pinky ring.
Wes Bos
It doesn't matter. This is a fun game.
Wes Bos
what people answer. Make sure you throw that on your list of things to answer because we always like getting the most possible people to answer these and to see the results.
Scott Tolinski
of folks, which is that's a good thing. Nice. 69% of folks. Yeah. It's obviously nice. I've never been laid off at all. That's great. Yeah. I'm surprised at this. I you would have thought that it would be, You know? But, a notice, essentially, that this was possibly going to be a short term opportunity and to you know,
Wes Bos
in a related field and 22%
Scott Tolinski
And you've worked for no companies, Wes? Yeah. I'm at zero so far.
Scott Tolinski
We have pulled up here on the screen. If you're listening via audio, we will talk through this. Video folks, it's on the screen. L l o if you wanna see it on video, youtube.com,
Wes Bos
37 years old, and the average age is 36.1.
Scott Tolinski
or in Denver within a reasonable distance from me, I think I would go in there at least a couple days a week, every week. Yeah. I think I would.
Wes Bos
or, like, like, what your title is or, like, often they'll ask me, like had longer work hours. Every time I go there, people are like, let's go to dinner at
Scott Tolinski
Weight issues, mental health issues, back pain, back pain. I thought back pain would be higher than that. I got back pain. Wes. And migraines,
Wes Bos
being, big developers Oh, that's I I did three. White Lotus, I've seen. Yeah. Ted Lasso, which is fantastic.
Wes Bos
full stack developer.
Scott Tolinski
and I do like to chitchat and be amongst, that makes sense.
Wes Bos
just slightly it's actually one funny thing JS I I look at all my stats from YouTube and and and, being deep in, like, a a bug or an issue, and then I'll I'll look up, and it's, like, five zero three. And I'm like, oh, man. I gotta I gotta start cooking dinner, like, right now. So I go up, and then it's just like,
Scott Tolinski
people came from Josh.
Scott Tolinski
which, and, leave it anonymously
Wes Bos
Just Crazy. Asterisk too. Blue Sky, But, yeah, 36.1 Yeah. The the significantly
Scott Tolinski
have been working a long time and are still under that, like, six figure number just because of where they're working rather than, like, yeah, responded. 77 people in the survey live in Denver because every single developer in Denver goes hiking.
Scott Tolinski
worth it on that chance? Yep. I've seen Dune, the substance like,
Wes Bos
is higher. So it's kinda interesting because, like, does that just mean be that they've been
Scott Tolinski
Pnpm, where there's been a lot of conversation about people who write issues or angry reports or whatever without contributing
Wes Bos
Desktop OS, though, 57% It doesn't doesn't put Japan in here just because, likely, it didn't have enough enough people.
Scott Tolinski
I had you know, I I got that little bump from working at that job, but I got a Still, Kendrick Lamar should be number one. I don't know Node people at TOOL. That is not a surprise knowing web developers.
Scott Tolinski
Yearly, all kinds of stuff. Who are developers these days based on this survey? As always, if you want to make these surveys more accurate, That must be Node. Phil, that must be nice for all you people. Yes. I'm a Okay. Here's another interesting thing is job happiness. The one on the left is if you are not allowed remote work. And Good relationships. That's, that's a different meaning. JS that the Coldplay My second dev job,
Wes Bos
into the office.
Scott Tolinski
Green bubble. No. I like, oh, you have a green bubble.
Scott Tolinski
have things like our our our health episode. Either way Productivity.
Wes Bos
Alright. I'll tell you. Top three JS US with $1.75.
Scott Tolinski
Nice.
Scott Tolinski
All respondents, yeah, 8%. USA, 9%. So USA is pretty much around the average here, which is, I have three different jobs. It's not like I had 10 different. Yeah. I think there's a point at which it becomes, oh, this person's not gonna stick around. I think there is that. I think that absolutely does exist, and that might prevent you from getting some jobs.
Wes Bos
not that Basecamp is bad, but I have not heard of anyone use Basecamp in Yarn. Like like, ten years.
Wes Bos
I can decide on CSS methodologies.
Wes Bos
Yeah. Maybe. And I also know that this survey was pushed pretty high And that's quite a bit considering that a couple Yarn ago, we were talking about
Scott Tolinski
you can interview for jobs, and you do not have to accept that job offer. Like, if I apply for a job 23% I'm surprised more people play do martial arts than do basketball, though. That is interesting. Martial arts seems like Productivity apps, 56% of people are having to use Jira. And I that's right. I say having to use because I don't know who's picking that by choice. Where's the a job unhappiness? Because there's a query builder here. You could you could technically filter, Vercel yearly income is the chart we have pulled up currently.
Scott Tolinski
JS interesting that it seems like it doesn't really matter. The outliers are still the same. It does seem like people with a degree have a higher,
Wes Bos
Four. I'm at one, and it's only because my kids took me to wild robot.
Scott Tolinski
And Yeah. Wes, in to in to introduce, Wes, I I should say, expected given that they are 1,000 like, that felt, like, fraudulent for me to be like, I'm an engineer Wes I know, like, the difference in what we do. You know? Yearly income. I wanna don't look at this. I want you to Wes.
Scott Tolinski
different function. If I'm in the same place for too long or whatever, I can get stalled out or I can just get, like, kind of, like, haze on me or something. But if I go to the office, I like that energy. And unlike you, I do like
Wes Bos
about developers because, like, we're on our own bubble. You can assume things. Like, the one I I can't wait to talk about is there's more Android users than iOS
Scott Tolinski
I'm not answering it. I don't even know.
Wes Bos
have con have contributed back code. Like, a lot of people that took a survey may not have the skills to to push back to, like, I could not contribute back to FFmpeg.
Wes Bos
see, That one that one wasn't in here, but for Scott of JS, we gotta get those numbers up or keep us at the top at least. Anything else to add? Should we wrap it up?
Scott Tolinski
RSS servers and, I seemingly, shout out to Sasha for throwing these things. Wes, what's up? Hey. Excited to talk about this. Yeah. I always love
Wes Bos
So go to the next physical activity one,
Scott Tolinski
all up and up and up. So,
Wes Bos
31, Python.
Scott Tolinski
Maybe not.
Wes Bos
Scott of Bravo. Anything that's on Bravo? Let's finish off in the metadata, see if there's any interesting thing in here. Browsers used to take the survey.
Scott Tolinski
Yes.
Scott Tolinski
and it is a nice salary bump and everything works out, which that's that's great. It would assume that number was higher, but that seems extremely high. Yeah. Yeah. Given the nature you know what? I because, you know, again, like Chad says open source is a gift economy. You know? Like, okay, people. And it it needed to scroll when I because look. When I hover before I hover, it just says relationships.
Scott Tolinski
Yeah. What's interesting, full stack developer as a title. 4% of folks have a full I didn't I've never never seen that as a title. I've seen that as being your responsibility, Speaking of employment, Century, Doh e Do Chi. Do Chi, cool. Great album. Imagine Dragons is not a cool band.
Wes Bos
having to do tasks and that, but, man, it's
Scott Tolinski
Then blue sky and Twitter coming in very similar.
Wes Bos
Only 5%.
Wes Bos
that you're trying to to link to and put out there.
Scott Tolinski
it it doesn't, you know, it doesn't really seem like it makes a difference necessarily.
Scott Tolinski
So get yourself an engineering title if you can.
Scott Tolinski
green bubble, She is my wife.
Scott Tolinski
that, of course, the voice you've been hearing and seeing on your screen is none other than Wes, the big man boss. My name is Scott Tolinski.
Wes Bos
like, worse, like, even higher, you know, of talk of Yep.
Scott Tolinski
Where's Love Island?
Wes Bos
And Switzerland also Mhmm. Mhmm. $125.
Scott Tolinski
happy with a very little 8% of being Chef, Love Island, all the these cooking shows and stuff.
Scott Tolinski
Leave those below in our our a potluck form on syntax.fm, Like, you know what? I really you Node, Coldplay. Jeez. Coldplay.
Scott Tolinski
You know?
Wes Bos
No. India, forty five average hours.
Scott Tolinski
M and A. This is a very funny I'm gonna find the first cool band on this entire list. K? The first cool band is Kendrick Lamar and then, Radiohead.
Scott Tolinski
and we're gonna be doing a show where we ask her all kinds of mental health questions. She gives us answers. I've been living with her for long enough that I know how to, you know, kind of get more out of some of these answers if if we need more to go deeper on some of this stuff. But she it's gonna be great. I can't wait to have her on again just because I always learn so much picking her brain every single day. But, yeah, if you if you have any questions about mental health stuff, 30% Apparently, that's entirely different. To call yourself an engineer in Canada unless you are states then.
Wes Bos
the more companies people have worked with dinner,
Scott Tolinski
Imagine Dragons.
Wes Bos
there longer, or does that mean, like, a lot of people will tell you the way to get more money is to hop around. You know? You've I have many times I've talked into talk to people where they're like, yeah. I got $40 are hybrid. That's by far the largest
Scott Tolinski
it it could be extended or whatever, but it wasn't contract Bos. And it was like,
Wes Bos
what do we got here? The average number of of companies that people are have worked at is 4.2.
Scott Tolinski
I sustained a really bad concussion and whiplash. I talked about it on this show. When it first happened, I was out of it. I took some time off briefly,
Wes Bos
and a bridge collapses and you signed off on that, then, yeah, you could go to jail.
Scott Tolinski
are progressing better enough that if some of you may have felt like I feel lighter lately, it's because I don't have this massive weight. I also got a really in-depth brain scan done. My concussion is fully healed. I've been going in there?
Wes Bos
that was a long time ago.
Scott Tolinski
But most people, I think, aren't working for the Silicon Valley companies, Fun game. I would put US up there for in the the highest. US is by far the highest,
Wes Bos
Remote work. This one's really interesting.
Wes Bos
average salary.
Scott Tolinski
But put,
Wes Bos
is obviously in US, but this is global. So Global. Salaries in The US tend to be higher. That's something that is also in this survey as Wes. But it does stick out to me that the jump from zero to four to five to nine
Scott Tolinski
Then just developer, 15. Senior engineer, 13. A lot of senior engineers. Or senior engineer. Yeah. Front end developer.
Scott Tolinski
to 36 k after one year because I had, like, you know, survived that one year, and that was, like, their actual
Wes Bos
lower salary for zero to four years
Scott Tolinski
different
Wes Bos
Chrome.
Wes Bos
Dune. Wes. Sure. Dune. Can we count how many of the top 20 I've seen?
Scott Tolinski
and then I I became a senior interactive producer, probiotic
Wes Bos
links to anything. So it was very hard. That that just goes to show that more people
Scott Tolinski
Vercel iOS, 47%.
Scott Tolinski
for general health and wellness throughout your entire life. I think that has become something that has become more common knowledge in in 2025 Let's do layoffs next year.
Wes Bos
What do you say to people who say that looks bad on your salary Wes you only have pretty good.
Scott Tolinski
Wes, like, it says the, you know, the fiftieth percentile here is 68,000.
Scott Tolinski
exclusively remote, hybrid.
Scott Tolinski
But I'm feeling much lighter and much better, now. I'm able to go back working out and everything like that. So you can make was that, like, you get into, you know, twenty five to twenty nine years of experience,
Wes Bos
file browsers and people who do martial arts, I think. People who have a samurai sword in their house. Yeah.
Scott Tolinski
amount. Which makes sense. You you went remote during COVID, and now it's like we Scott have you back some capacity. But Yeah. Yeah. Ex 24% only 25 or 27% Snacks with a purpose.
Wes Bos
unhappy people in their job. Oh, yes. What percentage of them use Jira and Windows together? that I am slowly aging out of my audience, which is funny because when I started, my audience was older than me. Yeah. And now they are get into the standing thing. So I'm I'm giving it another go, and I'll I'll give you guys all an update in a couple months.
Scott Tolinski
you should be using for your podcast.
Wes Bos
somebody from wanting to hire you?
Scott Tolinski
The rest of this stuff, yeah, I don't know. Where's where's Love Island?
Wes Bos
Specifically me, Node, because my job requires yapping on a
Scott Tolinski
that was it. You gotta check out the Node CJ and I did on RSS feeds because he talks about modern clients and modern
Wes Bos
is average of of $30. Now this is this
Scott Tolinski
hundreds upon hundreds of muscle twitches a day, and it's been very tough for me mentally to get through that. But I do wanna report that
Wes Bos
Sleep Token. Yeah. Lots of Metalheads.
Scott Tolinski
maybe will see Interstellar. I don't know why I haven't seen that by now. Oh, I did see the Lord of the Rings. I don't really care about any of the aliens. Romulus looks terrible.
Scott Tolinski
Yeah. Surprisingly, a lot of doves out there who who listen to this show are gonna be working for agencies or one off company. They're gonna be a regular salaried employee at a company. And I remember my first Sanity dev job was working for an agency. I made $27,000
Wes Bos
Okay. I have a a quiz for you. What country puts in the most hours? someone did a one week boot camp and and was making a $150
Scott Tolinski
I I'd like
Wes Bos
microphone all day.
Scott Tolinski
Yeah. Only a 139 people are edging. MacOS w two job until I joined Century.
Wes Bos
my buns off, this JS in every single country. Yeah. Netherlands, Poland,
Scott Tolinski
So people who may be wondering what's up with me, that's what's up.
Wes Bos
of people have no remote work? wham, like, What percentage
Scott Tolinski
in my salary Layoffs.
Wes Bos
the pnpm
Scott Tolinski
Unsurprisingly, have used open source software. Sure.
Scott Tolinski
have said yes
Wes Bos
kids problems. And just I'm just like
Scott Tolinski
which I don't like musicals, and I don't like The Wizard of Oz, but I saw Wicked,
Wes Bos
That's because they have,
Scott Tolinski
and kept me asleep and really saved my bacon. Went from two hours of sleep to eight hours. I know a lot of people don't wanna take medication for this, but if you're getting really bad sleep, it's gonna screw up a lot of other stuff. So are sitting around listening to Pink Floyd while they develop that. I understand that. I get it. Yeah. Let's talk about and say, hey. Yeah. Hey. Alright. What do you what do you think about this? Or, like, that Dune part two, and then I did see Wicked, of you who answered the survey, you know, if you got any ideas, we got, you know, a lot of interesting stuff on here. Wes, I'm gonna give a small health update for me given that I have a number of these things given my recent injury. In recent February,
Wes Bos
You know? And it's I thought that they worked way later than us, but maybe not.
Wes Bos
Firefox, 13%
Scott Tolinski
We love these surveys because they tell us so much about our industry, hosting your own stuff and almost all it's pretty neat. So that was a really good episode. Check it out, but I think just
Wes Bos
Yeah. Deno.
Wes Bos
The most commonly reported health issue is poor sleep.
Scott Tolinski
wrist and hand fatigue, ergonomics, folks. I worked my I I worked myself out of wrist and hand pain just by changing my ergonomics. That's for sure. Chronic fatigue, I think that goes along with poor sleep wrap it up. I'm gonna go eat some of my respondents out of the eight and a half thousand.
Scott Tolinski
a long time. In fact, even as recently when Wes was here for our Syntax meetup and event in Denver when that happened, I was still experiencing basically, 118,000.
Wes Bos
No. I have not been been playing any video games and never never have. We do have the original
Scott Tolinski
Mhmm. Employer count. Residents who have worked for how many companies? State of devs, 2025.
Scott Tolinski
how long they've been working. Where's the state of management? being having to go into remote, but it's a it's a pretty massive deficit.
Scott Tolinski
they do them all the time. So just do the you know, Node come to any of these surveys whether it's Scott of JS, State of Devs, whatever. Look out for them. I'm sure there's a subscription on here you can, like, be alert to them. So if you're if you're one of those people who's gonna come in and be like, these aren't accurate, Wes, then, like, help make them accurate. We don't have any affiliation with State of Devs, but Sasha, who does put these together, is great guy and, he's always been a a good friend of the pod. So, and some of these other ones, joint pain. Hey. Mental health issues, thirty percent.
Scott Tolinski
substantial very unhappy has a massive 11%,
Wes Bos
and, and work there. So those are those are the top ones. And then the lower end ones,
Scott Tolinski
Reddit makes sense. It is funny, though. Like, as far as the devs I follow and really like, I would say it is kinda fifty fifty if they post on Twitter or just Blue Sky, you know, who I follow. So I don't know. I go I go to the apps for, different people, I suppose.
Scott Tolinski
Welcome to Syntax. Today, we are talking about data for developers as we talk about the state of devs survey that was just dropped, the state of devs 2025.
Scott Tolinski
And the phone problem is that I picked up the I was, using Android. And when we switched to iOS,
Wes Bos
What the hell? How how is how is their options? Oh, you have to you have to write them in.
Wes Bos
Quite a bit happier.
Scott Tolinski
59%
Wes Bos
What is the highest country after that, it drops off quite a bit. You get Canada, Denmark. Canada's not known for its tech salaries, which is we we have something here called the brain drain, which JS, unfortunately, a lot of our good developers go down to The States
Scott Tolinski
Okay. Let's talk about health health and fitness. We love health and fitness. We gotta do our annual health and fitness episode again, and and Yeah. We should do that new year, new me territory. You know, we should just make that a whole dang month. New year, new me syntax, So that's like yeah. A lot of people are very unhappy, is being up kind of the highest
Wes Bos
Oh, I did pretty good.
Scott Tolinski
my wife was like, if we're switching, like, I don't wanna switch back like, baseline and a higher average. The fiftieth percentile JS 90 k versus 70 k. So maybe that degree is still counting for something in this regard, but, you know, the upper bounds are still the same.
Scott Tolinski
Anything with the with the, average or the fiftieth percentile being $90,000 mental health challenges of any kind. She is a doctor of psychology.
Scott Tolinski
and the best part about having executive in your job title is that you get a lot of emails from companies being like, you, sir, our decision maker at Century Corporation. Like, you know,
Wes Bos
is that on there? I'm always curious about that. Like,
Scott Tolinski
very time sinky and will suck you in. It's great. I love it. My favorite game on this list is Clear Obscure. That game was fantastic.
Scott Tolinski
I did say that at one point. Yes. Health issues? not not a medic medication recommendation.
Scott Tolinski
is another big one. Things like part of the company in comp and feature or, like, those things are all only things that happen it has been my experience But that's still, like, in the nineteenth percentile
Wes Bos
Oh. Which is and then you just carry you just wear around this, like, iron pinky ring all year round. That's pretty cool. But, like, they build bridges
Scott Tolinski
The average salary difference between job titles containing engineer and those containing developer is $44,000.
Scott Tolinski
I would like to see everything everywhere all at once.
Wes Bos
as as I like to say. But
Scott Tolinski
It's not still in there.
Scott Tolinski
to, you know, not have somebody watching over you, you know, you might pop on Netflix or something. Me, personally, I will say I used Basecamp when I worked for Ghostly International, and I thought it was bad then. I have not used it since. Node liked it back in the day. Camp.
Scott Tolinski
Sasha.
Wes Bos
and do things like that, and if they're legally liable. Right? If you if you build an app that 25%, are,
Scott Tolinski
That's odd that that is even an option on this tab,
Wes Bos
That's crazy. I would've thought that'd be higher. So 38% Running, biking, yoga, swimming, climbing,
Scott Tolinski
Reddit.
Scott Tolinski
I have maybe had consecutive days, Scott, like, straight consecutive days, but I've had a streak of days, like, five, six, seven days long with no twitches.
Wes Bos
out the door.
Scott Tolinski
No remote work still has basically the same range. It looks like there there's not a ton of correlation there. And there there could be something here, but it's not, like, obvious.
Scott Tolinski
favorite And we also like it when it says Syntax is their favorite podcast by a massive
Wes Bos
7% of them Yarn, but not so much into soccer. I thought soccer would be much higher than that. So much into soccer.
Wes Bos
$125.
Scott Tolinski
Then we'll see. No kidding. A higher education degree, The rest of them, I don't know. Sinners, maybe?
Wes Bos
Man, I was huge on RSS readers, and I love that. And and to me,
Scott Tolinski
And then,
Wes Bos
high quality of life there. They're just having how many of these people have a higher education degree?
Scott Tolinski
in The Netherlands. I I love going to The Netherland
Wes Bos
Big fan.
Scott Tolinski
I'm just going to places I know developers at. That's what's happening to me.
Scott Tolinski
I think people have really grown to the fact that strength training is more than just gaining muscle. It's
Wes Bos
remote. Wow. And then 33 58% movies, TV, 53%
Scott Tolinski
It is
Wes Bos
p a d p l? Paddle?
Scott Tolinski
Yeah. You know what's interesting about this? I didn't even know that web developers got the title of engineer until, 44 next highest is LinkedIn, office culture, interactive producer. I don't know where my company got the title of interactive producer.
Scott Tolinski
a year that was in 02/2011.
Wes Bos
but
Scott Tolinski
Stardew Valley, obviously, great. Favorite movies,
Wes Bos
exclusively
Scott Tolinski
Age. Age is part of your health, apparently.
Scott Tolinski
so it goes higher. But then, it's probably just because there's less respondents. You see less outliers. So, like, more of it's clustered. So it does seem like it it does correlate to years of experience here, but I would imagine there's definitely some folks who
Wes Bos
a couple years under six or seven different companies? You know? Like,
Scott Tolinski
episode c, Jen, I recorded about RSS. I was like, I'm probably only 40 year old. I'm not 40 yet, by the way, folks, but I'm just about. I'm probably the only near 40 year old who
Wes Bos
and then I became a web developer. I thought engineer was the the guy who sits in the caboose of the train and shovels coal into the the engine. Right? Well, my dad is an actual engineer. He, he designed majority
Scott Tolinski
Social media. I often wonder about social media stuff considering the patterns that we see. Looks like 44% of y'all are using Instagram.
Scott Tolinski
And that became the first two days entry level. Yeah. I I don't really know the circumstance to it. But either way, I I for the most of the time I worked in that job, it was, like, 36,000.
Wes Bos
Wes, 9%
Scott Tolinski
Yes. And Right. Yeah.
Scott Tolinski
And then when you get into ten years of experience, that when that way, you're getting in a bit more into the 6 figure territory with some making significantly more. You know, the thing I thought about found about this interesting I was then bumped up
Wes Bos
of it. So the highest layoffs in the last twelve months has been Brazil.
Wes Bos
PHP. That makes sense. Bash. Who names who calls themselves a Bash programmer? Alright. Let's do let's do the same for TV shows.
Scott Tolinski
The yeah. We played, the new Switch two, Wes. You should consider it, man. We we've been playing Sanity Mario Kart. My daughter and I put the little Switch two on a kickstand on the plane, and we played Mario Kart for, like, a long time on a flight, and it was like a blast. She was just going nuts. Man. Camping, a 120,000, I cannot stop. I am like all my stuff's here. I'm sorry. I'm too embedded in the ecosystem.
Scott Tolinski
Oh, man. Mine's actually not good. Yeah.
Wes Bos
because I own my own company, they're like, what do you do? And, like, what is your title at at your company? And it's either like, am I the CEO?
Scott Tolinski
in, like, health issues, I understand them, folks. The poor sleep thing was killing me. So if you can't figure out your sleep, I took something called trazodone, which is an SSRI for sleep, I believe, or it's an antidepressant for it might not be an SSRI.
Scott Tolinski
today. These things get dropped all the time, but this one teaches a little less a little bit about whether, like, you have your what jobs are out there, even the status of layoffs and things like that. But we're gonna be talking about health, technology, I've thought here.
Scott Tolinski
yeah, pretty high at fifteen. Walking and hiking at 77
Wes Bos
which I would not have guessed. Although I was maybe I would have. Yeah. You would have guessed that. Alright. Well, we'll we'll get down into that, but let's start with the the career stuff. Talk a little bit about income and whatnot.
Scott Tolinski
Where is the Real Housewives? You got 23 people out of 6,800
Wes Bos
And then if you look at the highest paying salaries,
Scott Tolinski
Same for TV shows. Favorite TV shows. Okay. How many of them have we seen?
Wes Bos
of the 8,000 respondents. If you go to the next page on workplace,
Scott Tolinski
a year. Does anything in this chart stand out to you, Wes?
Wes Bos
That's nuts.
Scott Tolinski
Vercel