Software Development Trends 2023: Cloud, DevOps and User Focus

Looking to 2024, artificial intelligence and team culture will be major influences on software development. The latest DORA report highlights that AI tools are now in common use across engineering teams, and early adopters see improvements in developer flow and productivity. However, they also caution that improper use can reduce stability (39% reported trust issues and slight performance drops). This signals that while AI can accelerate coding and testing (e.g. code generation, automated reviews), teams must integrate it carefully.

Key Trends:

Generative AI & Automation: Software teams are increasingly using AI assistants (LLMs) for coding, documentation, and infrastructure tasks. This trend is broad: over 90% of organizations report significant AI usage in 2024. Developers use AI for generating boilerplate code, writing unit tests, and even for intelligent error detection. Early gains in velocity and satisfaction have been noted, but careful supervision is required to ensure code quality.
Platform Engineering: Creating self-service internal platforms for developers is becoming widespread. Large organizations are building standardized developer platforms (onboarding, common services, CI pipelines) that dramatically improve productivity. The 2024 DORA data show that well-designed platform engineering efforts yield substantial performance improvements, especially in big companies. Smaller teams may find this approach more challenging, so it’s often scaled to fit.
User-Centric & Lean: The emphasis on customer value continues. Teams practice “shift-left” everything (security, testing, UX feedback) in the pipeline. User-centric design is not just front-end: developers write features with end-user workflows in mind, improving quality and reducing rework (as earlier research found).
Hybrid and Multi-Cloud: Despite virtualization gains, many enterprises prefer a mix of on-prem and cloud for 2024. Cloud agnostic tools and container portability are key. Infrastructure as Code (Terraform, Pulumi) remains vital, and GitOps-style deployments are growing.
Continued DevSecOps: With a more complex threat landscape, automated security (SAST, container scanning, compliance-as-code) is embedded in pipelines. The EU’s AI and cybersecurity regulations also drive a cautious approach. By design, robust logging, observability stacks, and automated rollback strategies (chaos engineering, canaries) are standard practice to maintain stability.

In summary, software development in 2024 is about enhancing developer efficiency (with AI and platforms) while keeping human oversight and user value front and center. Teams that balance cutting-edge tools with strong fundamentals (documentation, testing, user feedback loops) will gain a clear competitive advantage in product delivery.

Software Development Trends 2023: Cloud, DevOps and User Focus

Key Trends:

Generative AI & Automation: Software teams are increasingly using AI assistants (LLMs) for coding, documentation, and infrastructure tasks. This trend is broad: over 90% of organizations report significant AI usage in 2024. Developers use AI for generating boilerplate code, writing unit tests, and even for intelligent error detection. Early gains in velocity and satisfaction have been noted, but careful supervision is required to ensure code quality.
Platform Engineering: Creating self-service internal platforms for developers is becoming widespread. Large organizations are building standardized developer platforms (onboarding, common services, CI pipelines) that dramatically improve productivity. The 2024 DORA data show that well-designed platform engineering efforts yield substantial performance improvements, especially in big companies. Smaller teams may find this approach more challenging, so it’s often scaled to fit.
User-Centric & Lean: The emphasis on customer value continues. Teams practice “shift-left” everything (security, testing, UX feedback) in the pipeline. User-centric design is not just front-end: developers write features with end-user workflows in mind, improving quality and reducing rework (as earlier research found).
Hybrid and Multi-Cloud: Despite virtualization gains, many enterprises prefer a mix of on-prem and cloud for 2024. Cloud agnostic tools and container portability are key. Infrastructure as Code (Terraform, Pulumi) remains vital, and GitOps-style deployments are growing.
Continued DevSecOps: With a more complex threat landscape, automated security (SAST, container scanning, compliance-as-code) is embedded in pipelines. The EU’s AI and cybersecurity regulations also drive a cautious approach. By design, robust logging, observability stacks, and automated rollback strategies (chaos engineering, canaries) are standard practice to maintain stability.