Programming Language Market Share and Trend

As a programmer, haven’t we sometimes wonder what is the most popular programming language out there? Or perhaps we are more interested with which get the highest pay or demand. I guess we know Java and .NET is the up and coming corporate standard, while C/C++ will always be there for performance, and PHP, RoR, Perl, Phyton, Lisp will be for open source, small business and of course, real web hackers. And of all languages, Javascript is becoming very important as web application becomes more demanding, popular and powerful.

Though we have a rough figure, but wouldn’t it be nice to have statistic to reinforce our thoughts? (Taken from O’Reilly Radar - Programming Language Trend). Anyway, these stats are based on O’Reilly book sales.


Java seems to be the big thing, looking at the tons of books on the shelf. Sometimes I think Java is just too huge, or tries to cover so many areas and do so many things. Why is Java loosing out? Perhaps it is getting too big and too enterprise and confusing? VB is loosing its grip, probably due to the introduction of .NET. But I still like VB 6’s simplicity and high productivity, though sometimes could be irritating and being less powerful. C/C++ is steady, but seems to be declining. Could it be due to C#? PHP is going steady, Perl is loosing out, SQL going up slightly and Phyton going down slightly. Ruby and Javascript seems like up and coming, due to Ruby on Rails and Web 2.0 hype.

I am a believer of C/C++, VB (could last a few more years), PHP and perhaps, Ruby on Rails.

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Another way to look at Market Share: Programming Language Trends via Google