This year’s survey highlights a strong culture of learning: 69% of developers learned new coding techniques or languages in the past year, and over a third (36%) focused specifically on AI-enabled programming. Not surprisingly, traditional technical documentation remains the most-used resource for developers to learn, ahead of AI tools, videos, or other forums.

Python continues its rise as the programming language devs are doing extensive work in over the past year, gaining 7% from 2024 to 2025. This speaks to its use as the go-to language for AI, data science, and backend development.

TL;DR for leaders

Give your developers two things: good documentation and hands-on practice with AI programming. Prioritize learning opportunities and environments with languages they use most and gaps you may need for company or AI objectives.

It’s also important to support continuous skill development without forcing AI adoption. One way to do this is by creating safe spaces, like community forums, for developers to ask complex questions of one another when AI tools fail.

A senior learning specialist at Morgan Stanley who joined our Leaders of Code podcast stressed the importance of embedding learning opportunities at work and how a culture of continuous learning preserves valuable institutional knowledge. She outlined some practical ideas for leaders looking to build such a culture at their organization, from building a central knowledge hub to creating knowledge-sharing rituals and reinforcing learning through retrospectives.