Why Objective‑C Is Losing Ground to Swift – A Look at the Latest TIOBE Rankings

Before 2014, Objective‑C was the primary language for macOS and iOS development, consistently ranking high on the TIOBE index and even winning the Language of the Year award in 2011 and 2012.

In 2014, Apple introduced Swift, which gradually replaced Objective‑C. In recent years, Objective‑C’s popularity has continued to decline, and it has fallen out of the top‑20 languages in the TIOBE ranking.

Swift’s popularity has also dropped, slipping from 11th place in March to 15th in April according to the same index.

The TIOBE index updates monthly, measuring language popularity based on search‑engine results.

Other languages show varied trends: Python remains hot in data science and AI; C stays at the top, followed by Java, Python, C++, and C#. Visual Basic and JavaScript hold the 6th and 7th spots. Assembly has risen above PHP and SQL to 8th, with PHP at 9th and SQL at 10th.

Among the top‑20 are classic languages such as Visual Basic, Delphi/Object Pascal, Ruby, Go, Swift, R, Groovy, Perl, and MATLAB. Notably, Fortran, the first commercial programming language from the 1950s, has re‑entered the top‑20.

A January survey by a programmer‑training company showed that JavaScript, Java, and Python are the most sought‑after languages in new developer hiring, with JavaScript used across front‑ and back‑end web development and Java popular for desktop, Android, and other platforms.