The research firms sees three ways AI will affect software developers going forward. In the short term, AI tools will generate modest productivity gains by complementing existing developer work patterns and tasks. Those productivity benefits, the firm suggests, will primarily affect senior developers in organizations with mature technology methods.
In the medium term, however, AI agents will have a more tangible impact on work patterns by automating and offloading more development tasks. At this point, so-called AI-native software engineering, when most code will be AI-generated rather than written by humans, will begin to take over in more and more app dev orgs.
In the long term, Gartner sees AI making development work more efficient, but organizations will also need even more skilled developers to meet the rapidly increasing demand for AI-powered software.
