Programming Language Rankings

Comments debate the accuracy and metrics of various programming language popularity indices like TIOBE, RedMonk, PYPL, GitHut, and JetBrains, questioning rankings for languages such as Python, JavaScript, C, and Ruby.

➡️ Stable 0.5x Programming Languages
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#5631
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Keywords

RedMonk PHP PYPL JS index.php HUGE VB tiobe.com SAS TIOBE rankings language popularity languages popular programming js 2015 index tags

Sample Comments

papsosouid Feb 27, 2013 View on HN

Just the usual suspects (redmonk, langpop, tiobe).

labrador Aug 3, 2022 View on HN

Use RedMonk instead: https://redmonk.com/sogrady/2022/03/28/language-rankings-1-2...

sarnowski Aug 4, 2021 View on HN

By which metric? TIOBE paints a different picture where also Python and JS are high but not exclusively.https://www.tiobe.com/tiobe-index/

dblotsky Mar 7, 2018 View on HN

The GitHut numbers show repository count. I'm sure there all sorts of small JS repos with 50 lines of code, boosting project porfolios of people everywhere. Of course lines of code also don't mean something good: some languages are a bit more verbose than others. The TIOBE index shows what programmers search for, which is likely unbiased by LoC or repository count. My goal really is to help show you that JS is popular, but not nearly as widely used (or desired) as people make it out to

d0mine Mar 9, 2025 View on HN

C is not even in the top dozen most popular languages https://www.jetbrains.com/lp/devecosystem-data-playground/

b3h3moth Mar 22, 2016 View on HN

This is not true[0][1][0] http://www.tiobe.com/tiobe_index[1] https://pypl.github.io/PYPL.html

BHSPitMonkey May 2, 2013 View on HN

Implying that the 6th most popular language on GitHub can't qualify as "very popular"?

rwallace Jan 8, 2017 View on HN

What ranking of language popularity do you think is more accurate than Tiobe?

Mikeb85 Dec 16, 2021 View on HN

Tiobe and Stack Overflow rankings don't mean much. Look how popular Tiobe ranks VB due to Excel macros, or SO ranks Bash and PowerShell very highly simply because people ask a lot of questions about it.

kerkeslager Sep 21, 2019 View on HN

He's wrong: https://www.tiobe.com/tiobe-index/