New survey data from GitHub reveals that AI use in software development is continuing to grow but with some stark regional differences. The survey interviewed 2,000 respondents with 500 from the US, Brazil, Germany, and India. Those who did the survey were mostly software engineers, developers, and programmers but there were also data scientists and software designers.
A huge 97% of the respondents reported that they"ve used AI tools at some point both in and outside of work. Software development teams have reported building more secure software with improved code quality. They report their testing code is better and that they"re seeing faster programming language adoption.
Data that GitHub collected shows that in the US and Brazil, 82% of respondents use AI inside and outside of work, while 17% only use it at work. In India, these figures stand at 79% and 20% respectively. In Germany, however, things are vastly different with just 70% using AI at work and at home, and 27% using it only at work.
Not only are individual developers using AI less in Germany, but their organizations are not pushing the technology as much. 27% of companies in Germany are neither encouraging nor limiting AI"s use and 14% are discouraging but not explicitly limiting AI"s use. These percentages are much higher than in the US, Brazil, and India where companies tend to either actively encourage and promote the use of AI or allow their use with limited encouragement.
According to GitHub, which has a vested interest in people using AI tools like GitHub Copilot, the benefits of AI-driven software development are "undeniable". It said that businesses can balance innovation, security, and organizational alignment to unlock these AI benefits.
With the supposed benefits of AI in software development, countries that see slow adoption of these tools could see their companies leapfrogged by overseas competitors.
Source: GitHub