CodeSignal’s State of Engineer Hiring Survey provides original insights on industry-wide trends in technical hiring today—including top technologies engineers use, in-demand specialties, current salary ranges for tech roles, and the impact of skills-based hiring practices.
dominates as the most popular coding language across technical roles.
Read moreCandidates who score higher on a CodeSignal assessment earn more in their jobs.
Read morehave the highest median salary of any technical role.
Read morelike Python 3, TypeScript, React, & Bash are the highest paying.
Read morenot a college degree, matters for predicting coding skill—and salary.
Read moreassessments to other types of pre-hire assessments.
Read more78% of respondents listed Python 3 as a coding language they use frequently. Python 3 also ranked as the top coding language for all tech roles except for one, front-end development.
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*Question: Which coding languages do you frequently use? Check all that apply.
When we looked at how respondents scored on their CodeSignal pre-hire assessment, we found that higher coding scores were associated with higher salaries. On average, for every 20 point gain on the General Coding Framework assessment, a candidate’s potential annual salary in software engineering and related roles increases by $3,500.
Back-end engineers are the highest paid of any tech role with a median annual salary of $120,000 – $139,999. And respondents who use Python 3, TypeScript, React, or Bash reported the highest median salaries.
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| Annual Salary (USD) | Percentage |
|---|---|
| less than $40,000 | 4.13% |
| $40,000 – $59,999 | 4.13% |
| $60,000 – $79,999 | 7.31% |
| $80,000 – $99,999 | 12.82% |
| $100,000 – $119,999 | 14.30% |
| $120,000 – $139,999 | 13.77% |
| $140,000 – $159,999 | 9.22% |
| $160,000 – $179,999 | 4.56% |
| $180,000 – $199,999 | 3.92% |
| $200,000 – $219,999 | 3.07% |
| $220,000 – $249,999 | 1.27% |
| $250,000 – $279,999 | 0.53% |
| $300,000 or more | 0.95% |
| Not applicable (paid an hourly rate/wage) | 20.02% |
By median annual salary
What this means: For respondents employed in an engineering role, using newer coding languages like Python 3, TypeScript, and React paid more than knowing older languages like Java, C, and C++. By and large, however, what coding language a software engineer uses isn’t the best predictor of their salary—their level of coding skill is.
*Question: If you are paid a salary, what is your current annualized salary (in US dollars)?
When we look at the data, the answer is clear: experience matters more than education. Years of coding experience is a strong predictor of coding skills, but education level is not. We also found that for each additional year of coding experience a software engineer has, their salary increases by $5,250 on average.
In addition to learning what coding languages software engineers and developers are using, what technical roles they hold, and how much they’re paid, we wanted to know more about the candidates who have strong coding skills—measured by scoring highly on a CodeSignal assessment. This meant asking questions like:
When we analyzed the relationship between education level and a candidate’s coding score, we did not find a relationship. We did, however, find a positive correlation between a candidate’s years of coding experience (from any source—professional, school, or hobby) and their coding score (p < 0.001).
Software engineers and developers with more coding experience have stronger coding skills. But we also wanted to know:
We found that for each additional year of coding experience a respondent has, their salary increases by $5,250 on average.
*Questions: What is your current highest degree? How many years of experience do you have coding (can be from any source – work, school, hobby, etc.)?
We asked respondents how they felt about a range of tech hiring activities, including various types of technical assessments, take-home assignments, and interviews.
| Hiring Experience | Average (Mean) |
|---|---|
| Completing take-home coding challenges | 3.47 |
| Completing timed coding assessments (in general) | 3.37 |
| Completing CodeSignal assessments | 3.41 |
| Completing coding interviews | 3.58 |
| Completing behavioral interviews | 3.78 |
| Take-home personality/behavioral assessments | 3.25 |
When we compared respondents’ perceptions of different tech hiring activities, we found that candidates view CodeSignal assessments more favorably than they do take-home personality or behavioral assessments (p < 0.001), which are often seen as less job-relevant and less face valid by candidates.
We also found that candidates view CodeSignal assessments more favorably than timed coding assessments in general (p = 0.034). This holds true when looking at data broken down by gender, as well—both women and men prefer CodeSignal assessments to timed coding assessments in general.
| Hiring Experience | Average (Women) | Average (Men) |
|---|---|---|
| Completing timed coding assessments (in general) | 3.27 | 3.42 |
| Completing CodeSignal assessments | 3.33 | 3.45 |
*Question: Please indicate your impressions of the following hiring experiences (1-5 scale, one being low and five being high).
Our 2023 survey offered a range of insights on popular coding languages today, salary ranges for top tech roles, how education and experience impact coding skills, and how candidates feel about the technical hiring process overall.
Python 3 dominates as the most popular coding language across technical roles.
Candidates who score higher on a CodeSignal assessment earn more in their jobs.
Back-end developers have the highest median salary of any technical role.
Newer coding languages like Python 3, TypeScript, React, and Bash are the highest-paying.
Experience, not a college degree, matters for predicting coding skill—and salary.
Candidates prefer CodeSignal assessments to other types of pre-hire assessments.
This report is based on a survey of thousands of individuals who took CodeSignal’s General Coding Framework (GCF) or Industry Coding Framework (ICF) assessments during the date ranges specified below. The survey was conducted via email outreach to verified test-takers using the SurveyMonkey platform.
General Coding Framework (GCF) post-survey and campaign survey data were merged. Industry Coding Framework (ICF) post-survey and campaign survey data were merged. Finally, GCF and ICF merged datasets were merged together.
The sample was limited to respondents who indicated they live in the United States and completed the GCF or ICF successfully.
The total sample size is 2,846 (GCF and ICF datasets combined).
Timeframe for candidate test completion for the GCF campaign was 2021-08-01 to 2022-07-27, and the timeframe for the ICF campaign was 2022-01-01 to 2022-10-31 (Year, Month, Day format).
