Will Web Development Become Obsolete?

No, Web Development will not become obsolete. If the current standards of web development were to become obsolete, the amount of re-education, adoption of new standards, and the technology involved would be so astronomical to implement that it will be almost impossible economically to achieve.

Web development involves building web applications that humans can use for communication, business, socialization, entertainment, transportation, exploration, healthcare, finance, and more. It takes a good understanding of humans to be able to develop a web application for humans.

This is why web developers are needed and will always be needed. As long as there are problems that can be solved through the internet, then web development will always be there.

Web development will continue evolving, and become more advanced. There will be new programming languages, frameworks, platforms, and tools. There will be changes here and there, but web development will not become obsolete.

When you look at the early days of web development, a lot of things have changed, some years back, we did not have Progressive Web Apps (PWAs), Single Page Applications (SPAs), or Motion UI. Things will keep changing, and these changes will make web development better and more advanced.

Some people think that the introduction of no-code platforms and web builders will make web development and web developers obsolete. Platforms such as Shopify, Wix, WordPress, Bubble, Weebly, Squarespace, Zyro, and many others are considered replacements for web development and web developers.

That is not true, you still need web developers to develop web applications that these platforms cannot build (web applications like Facebook, Google Analytics, Amazon, etc.) and you also need web developers to build and maintain these no-code platforms.

Think of WordPress for example, you need web developers to build themes, plugins and make the entire platform secure. In the case of Shopify, you still need developers to work on themes and other Shopify apps that can add more functionality to your store.

WILL WEB DEVELOPMENT BE AUTOMATED?

There are some parts of web development that can be automated, this is what platforms such as Shopify, Wix, WordPress, Bubble, Weebly, Squarespace, Zyro, and many others have done. Some parts of web development are repetitive and common to nearly every web application, these tasks can be automated.

But there are other tasks that you cannot automate. Web Development in its entirety cannot be automated. Although these platforms can help you to make a fully working website in just a few minutes without writing any code, there are limitations to what you can make.

Some of the technologies that were thought to automate web development are already falling off and being replaced by other technologies. Joomla, Drupal, and many others are no longer as popular as they use to be, but web development continues to grow.

Other people point to Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence to be the ultimate solution to automating web development. but the truth is Artificial Intelligence is far from understanding humans and their needs.  

While machine learning and artificial intelligence are heavily used in web development for various tasks including automation, it is not the entire web development field that is automated but only some parts that computers are extremely good at.

IS WEB DEVELOPMENT DYING?

Web development is not dying, it is actually glowing and thriving. There are some programming languages, frameworks, and tools used in web development that are falling off, but web development itself continues to grow and thrive.

In 2020 in the United States alone, there was an estimate of 178,900 Web Developers, this number is forecast to increase to 205,000 by 2030 according to Statista.

According to the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, ”employment of web developers is projected to grow 13 percent from 2020 to 2030, faster than the average for all occupations. About 17,900 openings for web developers are projected each year, on average, over the decade.”

These statistics are evidence that Web development is not dying. It is growing strong year over year. Actually, web developers and other types of developers are so on-demand that some companies are paying just to interview. There is no good time to become a web developer than now.

Some of the technologies, frameworks and programming languages used in web development are slowly dying and falling off but web development continues to head north. Web development is not dying and will remain a major driving force for the internet for many years.

Some people think no-code platforms and website builders will kill web development, but these technologies will just help to accelerate and make web development more accessible to a lot of people. These platforms are not meant to replace or kill web developers, but to make it easy to develop web applications.

CONCLUSION

It can be seen that there is enough evidence to conclude that web development will not become obsolete. Statistics show that web development is growing and thriving, and the number of web developers needed to work on various projects continues to grow.

Although some technologies, tools, and programming languages used in web development will become obsolete with time, new technologies, and frameworks that are suitable for modern development and needs are being developed and deployed every day.