AI Improves Devs Skills, Enhances Their Roles

Written by Sue Gee

Wednesday, 12 November 2025

How do developers expect their roles and careers to be redefined by AI in 2026? New research reveals that 74% expect to shift from coding to designing technical solutions.

This finding comes from latest edition of the Dev Barometer, which reports on the findings of quarterly global survey conducted by BairesDev, a company that provides software development services, outsourcing and staff augmentation services. Respondents included 501 developers and 20 project managers from Fortune 500s and SMBs across 40 countries all of whom were working for BairesDev or were job applicants.

Introducing the Dev Barometer Q4 2025 Report, Rodrigo Outumuro writes:

Developers aren’t being replaced; they’re being enhanced. At the start of 2025, developers feared AI would automate them out of relevance. By year’s end, they had become its most valuable collaborators.

The previous report in the series, for Q3 2025, had already revealed that 88% of respondents felt they had benefited from using AI tools in their work, reporting an average saving of 7.3 hours in coding time, i.e almost 1 day per week.

More detail of the benefits are provided by the Q4 survey in which 4 in 10 developers said that AI expanded their career opportunities in 2025. While developers still spend most of their time writing code (48%), debugging (42%), and planning (35%), the nature of that work is changing. AI-powered projects lead to both quantitative and qualitative gains with tasks once dominated by debugging and boilerplate code giving way to system design, auditing, and orchestration. Currently devs see the impact of AI being greatest in speed of project delivery (63%) and improved team efficiency (52%) with greater scope for creativity in innovation (42%) not far behind

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Commenting on the findings Outomuro observes:

With repetitive coding off their plates, they’re using AI to test ideas faster and solve problems more creatively. That constant exchange between human direction and machine execution is redefining how work itself evolves.

Asked to look to the future, almost 2 out of 3 devs think their role will be redefined with less time spent on coding and more spent on designing solutions. Half of respondents foresee greater emphasis on architecture and strategy, which means an enhanced role:

A significant 74% of respondents already credit AI with sharpening their technical skills:

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Rodrigo Outumuro concludes his blog post with the suggestion that:

Developers are leading the way toward an AI-native workforce

explaining that when human expertise and AI evolve together, work becomes more strategic, creative, and connected. He suggests that BairesDev's research points to what’s next for every knowledge worker: deeper specialization, smaller and more agile teams, and a constant need to learn and concludes by stating:

Developers are setting the standard for how humans and AI can work together.