Every two years, the team at Planet Argon runs the Rails Developer Survey. And every two years, I go through the same process… a long list of questions, a hard look at how much time we’re asking of respondents, and a lot of cutting.
If you’ve filled it out before, thank you. If this is new to you, here’s the short version: it’s an open survey for Rails developers at all experience levels and across all kinds of organizations. We compile the results and share everything publicly. No paywalls. No vendor spin. Just a snapshot of what the community is actually doing.
We first ran this in 2009… back when ”should I use Rails?” was still a serious question… and have been doing it every two years since 2012.
It’s become something we rely on heavily at Planet Argon. In client conversations. In blog posts. On podcasts. In talks. When someone asks, “what are other teams doing with X?”… we’d rather point to data than speculate.
And then there’s the less practical reason. We’ve been in this community a long time. Someone should be asking these questions. We’re fine being the ones who do.
What’s in the 2026 survey
I’ll be upfront… I have a heavy hand in what makes it in. It’s a team effort with plenty of discussion and refinement, but the final call usually comes down to me.
The filter isn’t just curiosity. It’s closer to: what reflects real decisions teams are making right now?
Those aren’t always the same thing.
This year, a couple of areas got expanded.
One is project types.
I want a clearer picture of what Rails teams have actually shipped… and what they’re actively changing right now.
Not just “we build SaaS” or “we have an API”… but the actual decisions showing up in roadmaps and backlogs.
Things like:
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Upgrading Rails or Ruby versions
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Moving off Heroku or changing hosting providers
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Consolidating services… or breaking things apart
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Reworking CI pipelines or adopting self-hosted runners
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Switching testing approaches between RSpec and Minitest
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Rethinking background jobs or authentication systems
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Overhauling the frontend layer
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Introducing tools like Kamal, Packwerk, or Rails Engines
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Experimenting with AI agents in development workflows
That’s the level of detail I care about.
“What is Rails being used for?” is still interesting.
What teams are actively changing is where things get useful.
The other is AI.
Leaving it out would’ve been an obvious miss.
We added questions based on input from folks in the community to get a clearer picture of what’s actually happening… how teams are (or aren’t) using AI day-to-day, where it’s showing up in real workflows, and how that compares to what we all see on LinkedIn and social feeds.
I care more about what’s making it into production than what people say they’re excited about.
A few things I’ve left out
Some people asked if we’d include questions about specific organizations or happenings in the Ruby and Rails ecosystem.
We won’t.
There are plenty of places for those conversations. This survey isn’t a proxy for grievances or a feedback channel aimed at anyone.
If something is mostly discourse, I’d rather wait and see if it turns into actual decisions teams have to make.
We do include a “what questions do you wish we had asked?” prompt at the end. People use it… sparingly… which I take as a decent signal we’re not wildly off.
How to participate
The survey takes about 10–15 minutes. It’s open to anyone working with Rails… solo developers, agencies, large teams… all experience levels.
Take the 2026 Rails Developer Survey
We’ll publish results shortly after it closes… and before Rails World 2026. As always, everything will be freely available.
If you want to share it with your team or community… do it. More responses means better data.
Thanks for being part of it.
