HackerRank, recently released its “2023 Developer Skills Report” based on their platform data.

The report shows that the demand for skilled tech talent is still increasing, and the number of freelancers has been growing. 

The Gig Economy is present and growing as we could see in the “Gig Economy on the Rise.” study analysis from Upwork Report. Most of the past year's scenarios are being followed in 2023.

DEMAND for LANGUAGES 

Popularity doesn’t necessarily translate to demand by employers. Only 1 in 5 assessments require a specific language, which means that mostly the remaining were left to the candidate’s preferences. 

Of the 20% or so of assessments that required a specific programming language, it is valuable to mention that Java, Python, SQL, C++ and JavaScript dominate the list as much as they did in the past year. 

In this survey, JavaScript is the fifth-ranked, and has nearly four times the volume of the next language ranked, Bash. SQL has been growing at a steady rate and managed to surpass C++, but is unlikely to see any further place-trading among the top five in 2023.


The Hired’s “State of Software Engineers in 2023“ Report showed that in 2022, Ruby on Rails was the most in-demand programming software skill by employers, followed by Ruby and Scala. A seasonal dip in December of 2022 was expected by HackerRank before they resume climbing. 

Considering market uncertainty, consistency through the first months of 2023 is predicted. Languages that grew in the last years will continue to grow. There’s no major place trading among the top-ranking languages at this point. 

PROBLEM-SOLVING AND MACHINE LEARNING DOMINATE SKILLS DEMANDS

Problem-Solving is the most popular skill by demand and also more foundational. It concerns understanding data structures and algorithms, so it’s not surprising to see it up top and it is more as a general competency check. 

Machine Learning remains the leading “discipline” by demand and its growth outpaces the overall market, as was predicted by Hired’s report. It has been an in-demand skill for several years and there’s no perspective of this changing. 


REST API grew by 179%, outpacing any other skill in the top 5. It also posted steadier growth than Problem Solving or Machine Learning, both of which have exhibited some month-to-month volatility. 

There seems to be a sustained and growing demand for developers who know how to connect all things. Data Wrangling, Data Visualization, and Data Modeling are all recent additions to HackerRank’s assessments, and they’ve proven quite popular. It indicates a significant demand and their raw numbers are enough to land all of them in the top 10.

Even though they’re both vying toward the lower end of HackerRank’s demand rankings, the divergence between Kubernetes and Docker is worth noting. Over the past year, K8 surpassed Docker and grew at 185% of the trend. 

Meanwhile, Docker lagged behind the market and barely grew at all, with active tests only increasing by single digits. This is likely ongoing fallout from Docker’s attempt at monetization, and the growth in Kubernetes and containerization services from other providers. 

Machine Learning and Data Wrangling vaulted several ranks to take third and fourth places, respectively. Lower down, HackerRank found Docker and Kubernetes engaged in the pattern observed elsewhere. 

Both are growing, but K8s is growing much faster. Docker boasted twice as many developers, while in 2022 that advantage is down to 10%. Is expected that Kubernetes pulls ahead in 2023.


At a glance, prevailing trends will carry into 2023. Problem-Solving, Machine Learning, and REST API continue to occupy the top three spots, well above the skills clustered in the longer tail. 

And they’re poised to open the gap even further in 2023. Fast-growing data science skills are not represented in this forecast because they are too new to reliably forecast.

THE STATE OF THE INDUSTRY

HackerRank saw the number of candidates assessed by them almost triplicate in the last five years, which doesn’t mean job interviews tripled, but shows the company’s growth. 

To study wider trends in the market, they’ve indexed text invites against their trendline to take a quick temperature check, where anything over 100 is performing above trend, and anything under 100 is below trend.


Compared to an index calculated from the Dow Jones Industrial Average, a general pattern emerges from the pandemic-related slowdown in 2020 to the slip back into under-indexing in 2022. 

This under-indexing doesn’t mean a decline so much as it means slow growth. With all the volatility and uncertainty in the broader global economy, predicting what 2023 holds is difficult, but this index can be revisited.

The scenarios predicted in our previous articles continue to be proven. 

The growth of freelance work has generated new trends that are growing, each at its own pace, but it already shows that the new style of work (freelancing, remote and hybrid modes) are here to stay. 

New technologies have also brought the search for non-traditional skills, not only by employers but also by employees. Even with the economic uncertainties, the perspective of growth remains.