What the May 2019 TIOBE Index Reveals About Programming Language Trends

TIOBE recently published its May 2019 programming language ranking, with the overall top‑ten remaining unchanged: Java, C, C++, Python, Visual Basic .NET, C#, JavaScript, SQL, PHP and Assembly.

Notable shifts include R falling out of the top 20 for the first time in three years, while Python continues to close the gap with C++. Swift is growing rapidly but still trails Objective‑C, PHP holds the ninth spot despite a two‑position drop, and Go slipped one rank but remains stable.

The full top‑20 list is presented in the accompanying chart.

Despite its decline, R’s exit is surprising given the booming demand for statistical programming in data mining and AI, which are integrating into more domains. Python emerges as the biggest winner, likely because statistical programming is moving from academia to industry and Python is more readily adopted by the industry. The scores of Python and C++ are now almost identical, underscoring Python’s prominence.

The TIOBE Programming Community Index measures language popularity based on the number of skilled engineers, courses, and third‑party vendors worldwide, using major search engines such as Google, Bing, Yahoo, Wikipedia, Amazon, YouTube and Baidu for calculations. While it does not assess language quality, it helps developers gauge current trends.