In the year 2024, the software development space is an innovation storm, and the statistics are incredibly compelling. Do you know that the global software development market is expected to reach the whooping figure of $858.10bn by 2028? Indeed, we are speaking about an industry that is not only expanding but skyrocketing.
But that’s just the beginning. This list of software industry statistics will take you from the meteoric rise of artificial intelligence and machine learning adoption to the unexpected groups of developers working on cutting-edge software today. Regardless of whether you are an experienced programmer or just a beginner, this blog post is your ticket to the world of data that will change the way you look at software development in 2024.
Software Development Industry Overview
The software development industry is booming, with a projected market size of US$698.8 billion in 2024 and a steady growth forecast of 5.27% CAGR reaching US$858.10 billion by 2028. This growth is fueled by several factors:
- Digital Transformation: Businesses are increasingly adopting software solutions to streamline operations and improve efficiency, contributing 4.1% to market growth.
- Economic Resilience: Despite economic uncertainties, global GDP growth adds 3.2% to the market’s momentum.
- Cloud Computing: The shift towards cloud-based software is a major driver, propelling the market forward by an impressive 6.1%.
However, some challenges loom on the horizon:
- Decreasing Software Spending: A concerning 5.5% decline might indicate tighter budgets or changing priorities.
- Geopolitical Tensions: The Russia-Ukraine conflict is estimated to shave off 3.1% from the market’s potential.
- Inflation: While manageable at 1.4%, inflation could put pressure on pricing.
Here are some additional significant statistics regarding software development as a whole:
- Market leader: The software development landscape is fiercely competitive, with tech giants like AWS (9%), Oracle (7%), and Microsoft (5%) leading the charge. Established players like Cisco, IBM, Salesforce, and SAP (all at 4% each) also hold significant market share.
- Geographic distribution: The United States dominates the global market, generating a staggering US$353.5 billion in revenue in 2024, which is nearly 50% of the combined total for the top 10 countries. This highlights the U.S.’s unparalleled dominance in the software development industry. However, other major players like China, the United Kingdom, Germany, and Japan are also significant contributors.
| United States | 353.5 |
|---|---|
| China | 39.88 |
| United Kingdom | 36.42 |
| Germany | 30.38 |
| Japan | 25.11 |
| Canada | 22.2 |
| France | 17.04 |
| Australia | 11.89 |
| South Korea | 10.22 |
| Netherlands | 9.81 |
- Software Segment Breakdown: Enterprise software reigns supreme, with a projected market volume of US$292.00 billion in 2024. Here’s a breakdown of the different software segments and their growth trends:
- Enterprise Software: Consistent growth, with the highest projected rate of 7.44% in 2024.
- Application Development Software: Previously held the highest growth rate, but it’s expected to decline steadily to 6.43% by 2028.
- Productivity Software: Experienced strong growth but is projected to see the sharpest decline, reaching 2.06% by 2028.
- System Infrastructure Software: Maintained steady growth but is expected to have the lowest rate (2.62%) in 2024 and decline to 1.16% by 2028.
| Application Development Software | 179.9 billion USD |
|---|---|
| Enterprise Software | 292 billion USD |
| Productivity Software | 79.07 billion USD |
| System Infrastructure Software | 147.8 billion USD |
Software Developer Demographic Statistics
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- Growth: As Statista states, by 2024, the global developer population is projected to reach 28.7 million, reflecting a growth of 3.2 million since 2020. China is expected to be a major driver of this expansion, with a projected growth rate of 6% to 8% by 2023.
- Distribution:
- The Asia-Pacific and Latin American regions are experiencing the strongest developer population growth overall (according to Evans Data).
- Despite strong growth in other regions, the US (18.33%) and India (12.61%) still hold the top spots for total developer population, followed by Germany (6.72%) and the UK (5.37%).
- Gender: The industry remains heavily male-dominated, with men accounting for 91.88% of developers. Women (5.17%) and non-binary/genderqueer/non-conforming individuals (1.67%) currently make up the minority.
- Experience and age:
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- Experience-wise, the industry is populated by developers with 5-9 years (29%) and 1-4 years (19%) of coding experience.
- Age-wise, the sweet spot for employing developers falls between 25-34 years old (39.52%), followed by those aged 18-24 (25.47%). Older developers are also present, although in smaller percentages (35-44: 18.42%, 45-54: 6.64%, 65+: less than 1%). Interestingly, there’s also a small portion (6.52%) of developers younger than 18.
- Salary: In May 2023, software developers earned a median annual wage of $132,270, outpacing software quality assurance analysts and testers, who earned a median annual wage of $101,800. This translates to a difference of roughly $30,470 per year.
Statistics of Software Development Trends in 2024
Here’s a breakdown of the top trends impacting software development today:
- AI adoption accelerates
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- Stanford University reports a 34% annual growth in AI patenting since 2000.
- AI software searches have also increased by 929% in the past five years.
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- Businesses adopt low-code and no-code development:
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- Searches for “low-code” increased by 286% and “no-code” by 950% in 5 years.
- 100% of enterprises using low-code report positive ROI, and more than half of medium—to large enterprises adopt these platforms.
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- Increase in cloud computing:
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- Cloud spending grew by more than 6% in 2020 to $258 billion.
- Amazon holds a 31% market share in cloud infrastructure services.
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- Continued expansion of the IoT
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- By 2025, there will be 65 billion IoT devices, six times more than in 2018.
- Smart speaker market could be worth $35.5 billion by 2025.
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- Use of Blockchain in software development expands:
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- The blockchain market is expected to grow to $291 billion by 2030.
- 73% of executives believe blockchain offers a competitive advantage.
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- DevSecOps aproach integrates security into the development process
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- 70% of security professionals moved security earlier in development.
- Organizations using DevSecOps deploy code 46x more frequently and reduce costs 56% more effectively.
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- Companies turn to outsourcing in the face of IT skills shortage:
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- 64% of executives cite talent shortage as a major barrier.
- IT outsourcing market is expected to grow to $689 billion by 2027.
Software Development Language and Technology Statistics
- According to Statistics, JavaScript and HTML/CSS lead the way as the most commonly used programming languages among software developers worldwide, with 63.6% of developers using JavaScript and around 53% using HTML/CSS. Python, SQL, and TypeScript also rank among the top five most widely used languages globally.
- Python is notably the fastest-growing programming language, with 70% of machine learning (ML) developers favoring it for their projects. Over six million software engineers currently use Python, benefiting from its open-source nature and the availability of essential libraries like PyTorch, NumPy, and TensorFlow.
- AWS and Microsoft Azure were the leading cloud platforms in 2023, with 75% of developers using these services. This strong adoption suggests a positive outlook for hyper scalers and the broader enterprise public cloud market in 2024.
Software as a Service (SaaS) statistics
The landscape of business software is undergoing a dramatic shift towards the cloud-based SaaS model. Here’s a breakdown of key points:
- SaaS dominates the cloud market:
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- SaaS is the largest segment within the public cloud market, accounting for roughly 30% of global spending.
- By the end of 2025, a staggering 85% of all business applications are predicted to be delivered through the SaaS model.
- Public cloud application services/SaaS end-user spending globally has soared from $31.4 billion in 2015 to a projected $232.3 billion by 2024, reflecting the meteoric rise of cloud-based software adoption.
- SaaS adoption is soaring:
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- A survey by FinancesOnline indicates that 91% of SaaS users think it will help them implement new technology and increase revenue.
- The average number of SaaS applications used by organizations has grown a staggering 1,525% between 2015 and 2022.
- As of 2022, organizations worldwide leverage an average of 130 SaaS applications, highlighting the pervasiveness of cloud computing and the shift toward specialized software solutions.
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- SaaS Market Leaders:
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- The United States stands as the undisputed leader in the SaaS landscape, boasting a staggering 9,100 companies operating in this space, dwarfing the second-place United Kingdom with its 1,500 SaaS firms, while Canada (992), Germany (840), and India (711) trail behind, highlighting the concentration of SaaS innovation and entrepreneurship within the American ecosystem.
| United States | 9,100 companies |
|---|---|
| United Kingdom | 1,500 companies |
| Canada | 992 companies |
| Germany | 840 companies |
| lndia | 711 companies |
- According to Statista, Zoho was the leading B2B SaaS CRM company worldwide in 2023 with a total revenue of $500 million, followed by Talkdesk at $229.5 million and Odoo S.A. at $178 million.
- Leading SaaS industries by customer base: As of January 2024, the leading industry for SaaS companies worldwide based on the number of customers was Artificial Intelligence software with 2.9 million customers, followed by Analytics software, E-commerce software, and Security software, each with 1.9 million customers.
| SaaS industries | Customers (in 1000s) |
|---|---|
| Artificial Intelligence software | 2,900,000 |
| Analytics software | 1,900,000 |
| E-commerce software | 1,900,000 |
| Security software | 1,900,000 |
| Development software | 1,700,000 |
| Legal software | 1,400,000 |
| Financial services software | 1,300,000 |
| Marketing software | 1,300,000 |
| Communications & media software | 1,000,000 |
| Blockchain software | 1,000,000 |
Enterprise software statistics
- Overall Market Surge:
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- The global IT spending on enterprise software has seen significant growth, with a staggering 232% growth over the nine-year period from 2015 to 2024.
- By 2028, the Software segment’s revenue is projected to grow to $858.06 billion, accounting for 25% of total IT industry revenue.
- In terms of revenue, global IT spending on enterprise software is expected to reach $1,029.42 billion in 2024, a substantial increase from $783.46 billion in 2022 and $913.33 billion in 2023.
- Specific software segment growth:
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- Business Intelligence (BI): Growing demand for data-driven decision making is fueling BI software’s steady rise, with revenue projected to reach $34.16 billion by 2028 (from $16.56 billion in 2016).
- Customer Relationship Management (CRM): The need for efficient customer management is driving significant CRM software growth, with revenue expected to jump from $54.13 billion in 2019 to a whopping $131.88 billion by 2028.
- Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP): Integrated systems for managing business operations are seeing continued adoption, with ERP software revenue projected to reach $62.36 billion in 2028 (from $38.69 billion in 2019).
- Business Productivity Breakdown: Collaboration software is expected to lead the business productivity market in 2024 ($15.05 billion), followed by office software ($29 billion).
- Security Software: Growing cybersecurity concerns are driving security software market growth, with revenue projected to reach $65.79 billion by 2026 (from $30.58 billion in 2017).
- Augmented Reality (AR) Software (B2C): AR gaming is anticipated to be the top revenue generator in the AR B2C market at $6.20 billion in 2024.
Mobile app statistics
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- Global app market growth:
- The number of mobile app downloads worldwide increased from 140.68 billion in 2016 to 257 billion in 2023.
- In the second quarter of 2022, the United States was the largest mobile app market worldwide with 1.86 billion downloads, while in the second quarter of 2023, it had 1.82 billion downloads.
- Global app market growth:
- App category popularity:
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- The segment with the highest number of mobile app downloads worldwide in 2024 was Games with 150,366.05 million downloads.
- The Education category saw a 2.36% increase in mobile app downloads worldwide in 2023.
- App store downloads: In the first quarter of 2023, the number of downloads from the Apple App Store worldwide was 8.10 billion, while the number from the Google Play Store was 26.90 billion.
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- Top downloaded apps by platform:
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- The most downloaded Android app in the Google Play Store worldwide in June 2023 was Instagram with 68.92 million downloads.
- The most downloaded iPhone app in the Apple App Store worldwide in June 2023 was Google with 6.36 million downloads.
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- Mobile App Spending:
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- The average amount spent by consumers on mobile apps per smartphone reached $5.05 as of the 3rd quarter of 2023, indicating a steady increase in app spending among smartphone users.
- Global consumer spending on mobile apps soared to $35.28 billion in the 1st quarter of 2024, reflecting the growing importance and monetization of the mobile app ecosystem.
- In the fourth quarter of recent years, global consumer spend on mobile apps exhibited fluctuations, hitting $64.60 billion in Q4 2020, rising to $70.00 billion in Q4 2021, dipping slightly to $68.70 billion in Q4 2022, and rebounding to $69.90 billion in Q4 2023, demonstrating the dynamic nature of the mobile app market.
Conclusion
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