TIOBE index
The TIOBE Programming Community Index, commonly referred to as the TIOBE index, is a monthly measure of the popularity of programming languages, reflecting the number of skilled engineers worldwide, the availability of courses, and the extent of third-party vendor support for each language.[1] Developed and maintained by TIOBE Software BV, a Dutch software quality company based in Eindhoven, it ranks over 150 programming languages based on their relative search volumes across major search engines and websites.[1] The index does not evaluate the quality, lines of code written, or technical merits of languages but serves as an indicator of their current relevance in the programming community.[1] The methodology involves aggregating search engine hit counts for queries combining a language name with terms like "programming," "language," or "tutorial," weighted by the engine's overall traffic.[2] Data is drawn from the top 25 websites ranked by Similarweb for search functionality and hit counter availability, including Google (9.06% weight), Wikipedia (8.70%), and Amazon, while excluding sites without reliable counters or those deemed inappropriate, such as Bing or adult content platforms.[2] Eligible languages must be Turing-complete, have a dedicated Wikipedia entry, and generate at least 5,000 Google hits; similar variants (e.g., C# and C-Sharp) are grouped to avoid fragmentation.[2] Ratings are normalized across sources and adjusted for false positives using confidence factors, with the final score representing a language's percentage of total hits.[2] This approach, while reliant on public search data, can include inaccuracies from unrelated hits, and TIOBE continues to refine groupings and calculations based on community feedback.[2] Launched in June 2001 with an initial set of 25 languages, the index has evolved to track historical trends dating back to 1995 using Usenet newsgroup data for pre-2001 periods and web searches thereafter.[1] It is widely used by developers, educators, and organizations to gauge language trends, assess skill demands in job markets, and inform decisions on adopting languages for new projects.[1] As of the November 2025 update, Python holds the top position with a 23.37% rating, followed by C at 9.68%, C++ at 8.95%, and Java at 8.54%, highlighting Python's sustained dominance driven by applications in data science and artificial intelligence.[1] Annual "Language of the Year" awards recognize the fastest-rising language, with Python earning the title in 2024 for the sixth time since 2007.[3]Overview
Definition and Purpose
The TIOBE Programming Community Index (commonly referred to as the TIOBE Index) is an indicator of the popularity of programming languages, developed and maintained by TIOBE Software BV, a Netherlands-based company specializing in software quality assessment. It measures the relative interest in various programming languages by analyzing global search engine queries related to each language, providing a data-driven proxy for community engagement and developer activity.[1][2] The primary purpose of the TIOBE Index is to offer a monthly snapshot of programming language trends, helping developers, educators, and organizations gauge the current relevance of languages for skill development, hiring decisions, or project planning. Unlike benchmarks that evaluate language performance or quality, the index explicitly avoids ranking languages as "best" or assessing the volume of code written in them; instead, it focuses on observable interest through search behavior as a reflection of broader adoption and discussion in the programming community.[1][2] In terms of scope, the TIOBE Index currently tracks over 150 programming languages, selected based on criteria such as the existence of a dedicated Wikipedia entry, Turing completeness, and a minimum threshold of search interest (at least 5,000 hits for language-specific queries on major engines like Google). Rankings are presented as relative popularity percentages that are normalized to sum to 100% across all included languages, emphasizing proportional market share rather than absolute metrics.[1][2]Update Frequency and Accessibility
The TIOBE Index is updated once a month, with releases typically occurring around the 7th to 10th of each month.[1] For instance, the November 2025 update reflects data compiled as of that period.[1] The index is freely accessible to the public via the official TIOBE website, offering users the ability to view current and historical rankings without any cost.[1] Key features include interactive charts powered by tools like Highcharts, as well as options to download basic datasets for further analysis.[1] However, the complete historical dataset, covering June 2001 to the present, is available only through a paid license priced at $5,000 USD, contactable via [email protected].[1] Rankings and trends are presented in clear formats such as tables for the top 20 programming languages and graphical visualizations for both short-term perspectives (e.g., the past 12 months) and long-term histories (annual averages since 1985).[1]Methodology
Data Collection
The TIOBE Index gathers raw data by querying a selection of popular search engines and websites to measure the popularity of programming languages based on search volume. Specifically, it uses 25 search engines ranked by Similarweb, selected according to criteria such as the presence of a search facility, availability of hit counts, delivery of HTML results, proper encoding, a minimum of one hit per query, few outliers, and exclusion of sites with adult content.[4] Examples of included sources include Google.com (9.06%), Wikipedia.org (8.70%), and Amazon.com (7.97%), based on Similarweb traffic rankings, while sites like Bing.com are excluded due to issues such as lack of counters.[4] The core query format employed is the exact phrase+"<language> programming", where <language> is replaced by the name of the programming language in question, such as +"[Python](/page/Python) programming" or +"[Java](/page/Java) programming". This approach aims to capture relevant search interest in programming contexts. To enhance relevance and filter out unrelated results—such as hits for city names or other non-programming entities—the process incorporates confidence factors (e.g., 90% for certain languages like Alice) and manual exceptions (e.g., appending -tv to exclude television references for languages like ABC).[4]
Languages are included in the index based on a predefined list that has expanded over time, currently monitoring over 150 programming languages. Selection criteria require each language to be Turing-complete, have a dedicated Wikipedia entry as a programming language, and generate at least 5,000 Google hits for the query +"<language> programming".[4] Similar languages are grouped together if they share Wikipedia redirects or lack separate entries, ensuring comprehensive coverage without user-submitted nominations.[4]
Data collection occurs via monthly snapshots, capturing current search volumes from the selected sources without applying historical weighting during the gathering phase. This provides a timely measure of global interest in each language.[1]
Index Calculation
The TIOBE index derives its popularity ratings from the number of qualified search results, or "hits," obtained for each programming language across multiple search engines. Specifically, the process begins by querying 25 search engines—selected based on their global popularity rankings from sources like Similarweb—for the exact phrase "+History
Origins and Founding
The TIOBE Index was created in 2001 by Paul Jansen, the founder and CEO of TIOBE Software BV, a Dutch software quality consultancy based in Eindhoven, Netherlands. TIOBE Software itself was established on October 1, 2000, with the acronym deriving from the title of Oscar Wilde's play The Importance of Being Earnest, symbolizing a commitment to sincerity and professionalism in software services. Initially developed as an internal tool, the index aimed to measure programming language popularity through search engine queries to help the company advise clients on technology trends and skill demands in the software industry.[5] Jansen began the project as a personal hobby to gauge which languages were in demand, starting with simple counts of search results for language-related keywords across major engines like Google. This approach provided a quantifiable way to track trends, reflecting the growing need for data-driven insights in consultancy amid the early 2000s tech boom. The methodology, though basic at inception, laid the foundation for assessing language relevance based on online mentions, without delving into code usage or developer surveys.[6] The index first appeared publicly in mid-2001, with data records beginning in June of that year, and was featured on the TIOBE website starting around July. At launch, it covered approximately 20 to 25 programming languages, focusing on established ones like C, Java, and C++ that dominated contemporary development discussions. This debut marked an early effort to democratize visibility into language ecosystems, predating more formalized popularity metrics.[1][7]Evolution and Milestones
Following its initial launch, the TIOBE Index expanded its scope significantly, growing from an initial tracking of 25 programming languages in 2001 to over 50 by 2010, as evidenced by monthly rankings that listed the top 50 languages during that period.[1][8] By October 2025, the index had further broadened to monitor over 150 languages, reflecting increased diversity in the programming ecosystem and the inclusion of emerging and niche languages such as SQL, which was added in 2018 after recognition of its Turing completeness.[1] This expansion allowed for a more comprehensive representation of global programming trends, with the top 50 ranked by popularity and the subsequent languages (51-100) listed alphabetically. Methodological refinements also marked key developments in the index's evolution. By 2008, TIOBE incorporated additional search engines beyond Google, including MSN, Yahoo!, and YouTube, to enhance the robustness of data collection and reduce reliance on a single source.[9] In 2012, the index introduced "Very Long Term History" charts, providing decade-spanning views of language popularity trends dating back to the 1980s, which offered users deeper insights into long-term shifts.[1] These updates, including a post-2010 split of "(Visual) Basic" into distinct dialects like Visual Basic .NET, improved accuracy and granularity without altering the core calculation formula.[1] Notable events in the 2020s highlighted the index's responsiveness to technological shifts, with surges in rankings for Rust and Go reflecting their adoption in systems programming and cloud-native development. Rust broke into the top 20 for the first time in June 2020 and achieved its highest position of #13 in February 2025, driven by growing interest in memory-safe languages.[10][11] Go, meanwhile, solidified its place in the top 10 throughout the decade, benefiting from its simplicity in concurrent programming applications.[12] Amid rising scrutiny, TIOBE CEO Paul Jansen clarified in 2023 updates that the index measures search-based popularity, not language quality or "best" status, emphasizing its role as an interest indicator rather than a prescriptive ranking.[1][13] Throughout these changes, ownership of the TIOBE Index has remained with TIOBE Software BV, a Netherlands-based firm founded in 2000, under the leadership of Paul Jansen as CEO and lead maintainer as of 2025.[1][14]Rankings and Analysis
Current Top Languages
As of the November 2025 TIOBE Index, the most recent available as of November 17, 2025, Python continues to lead the rankings with a dominant market share, reflecting its widespread adoption in diverse applications from data science to web development.[1] The top 10 programming languages are tabulated based on the relative shares derived from search engine queries, skilled engineer availability, and course/courseware offerings across major platforms, providing a snapshot of current popularity.[1]| Position | Language | Rating (%) | Monthly Change (%) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Python | 23.37 | +0.52 |
| 2 | C | 9.68 | +0.67 |
| 3 | C++ | 8.95 | -1.69 |
| 4 | Java | 8.54 | -1.06 |
| 5 | C# | 7.65 | +2.67 |
| 6 | JavaScript | 3.42 | -0.29 |
| 7 | Visual Basic | 3.31 | +1.36 |
| 8 | Delphi/Object Pascal | 2.06 | +0.58 |
| 9 | Perl | 1.84 | +1.16 |
| 10 | SQL | 1.80 | -0.14 |
Historical Trends
In the 2000s, the TIOBE index was dominated by C, which consistently held the top position, followed closely by C++ and Java in the second and third spots, reflecting the era's focus on systems programming, performance-critical applications, and enterprise software development.[1] Python, while present, fluctuated between 7th and 24th place, indicating its niche role in scripting and scientific computing at the time.[3] The 2010s marked a shift toward more versatile languages, with Java ascending to the number one spot for much of the decade, while C and C++ maintained strong positions in the top three due to their enduring use in embedded systems and high-performance computing.[1] Python began its rapid ascent, climbing from 7th place in 2010 to 3rd by the end of the decade, driven by growing adoption in data science, web development, and automation.[3] Meanwhile, newer languages like Go emerged but started from lower rankings, reaching the top 20 by 2019. Entering the 2020s, Python solidified its dominance, overtaking Java to claim the second position in November 2020 for the first time in the index's history and reaching number one in October 2021.[15][16] This rise coincided with the explosion of artificial intelligence and machine learning applications, boosting Python's share from around 6% in 2015 to 23.37% by November 2025, representing an average annual increase of approximately 1.7% in index rating over that period.[3] In parallel, Go advanced to 7th place by mid-2025 before slipping to 11th by November, benefiting from cloud-native and concurrent programming demands, while Rust grew steadily amid systems safety trends, peaking at 13th in February 2025 and ranking 14th as of November 2025.[11] Legacy languages experienced notable declines post-2015, with COBOL dropping out of the top 20 for extended periods, reflecting reduced search interest as modernization efforts supplanted mainframe-centric development; by November 2025, it ranked 25th despite brief re-entries in 2024.[17][18] The TIOBE index's very long-term history chart illustrates these patterns, showing C's steady leadership through the 2000s, Java's mid-decade peak, Python's exponential curve from the mid-2010s onward, and the gradual upward trajectories of Go and Rust against a backdrop of declining older languages like COBOL.[1]| Language | 2002 Rank | 2010 Rank | 2020 Rank | 2025 Rank (Nov) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| C | 1 | 2 | 1 | 2 |
| C++ | 2 | 3 | 4 | 3 |
| Java | 3 | 1 | 2 | 4 |
| Python | 7 | 7 | 3 | 1 |
| Go | N/A | 172 | 13 | 11 |
| Rust | N/A | N/A | 16 | 14 |
| COBOL | N/A | N/A | N/A | 25 |