Electric Capital's latest crypto developer report: The number of monthly active developers has decreased by 27%, but senior developers are still contributing
Since the bear market three years ago, the number of developers has increased by 66%.Original author: @eherrerosj
Original compilation: Luccy, BlockBeats
Electric Capital released an updated October developer data analysis on social media on October 19, indicating a decrease in the number of new developers exploring cryptocurrency in 2023. BlockBeats has compiled the updates as follows:
We reviewed over 164 million crypto commits and reached the following conclusions:
As of October 1, 2023, the number of monthly active open-source developers is 19,300. Compared to the same period last year, the number of developers has decreased by 27%.
The developers recently leaving the crypto space are primarily newcomers, with less than 12 months of experience in the field, accounting for about 25% of all code submissions. This finding is consistent with our research results from July 2023, and this trend continues.
Developer numbers have increased by 66% since the bear market three years ago
Compared to the last bear market, the number of developers has increased by 66%, but the number of developers in 2023 has decreased, down 27% compared to October 2022 and down 4% compared to October 2021.
Despite long-term growth, what has happened since October 2022?
Developers with over 1 year of experience continue to contribute, while many newcomers are leaving
We can categorize monthly active developers based on their time working in the crypto space by comparing their first and last commit dates:
- Newcomers: Developers with less than 1 year of experience in the crypto space
- Emerging: Developers with 1 to 2 years of experience in the crypto space
- Mature: Developers with over 2 years of experience in the crypto space
In the past year, the decrease in monthly active developers primarily stems from the newcomer stage. This indicates that while the crypto space has maintained long-term growth, many newly joined developers may have chosen to leave for various reasons (such as market volatility, intense competition, etc.) since October 2022. However, those who have worked in the crypto space for over 1 year continue to contribute, which may suggest they have higher confidence in the crypto field or have found stable development opportunities in the industry.
We can see that the number of newcomer developers has decreased by 58%, the number of emerging developers has moderately increased by 11%, while the number of mature developers has slightly increased by 5%.
Why has the number of newcomer developers decreased?
The number of new developers exploring cryptocurrency in 2023 has decreased
First, the decrease in newcomer developers is due to fewer new developers entering the crypto space. As of October 2023, there have been 1,721 new developers joining the crypto field. In comparison, the number of new developers entering the crypto space has decreased by 40% since June 2023; down 64% since October 2022; and down 67% since the market peak in November 2021.
Newcomers often dominate during market peaks
Second, newcomers dominate during bull markets but decrease during bear markets. This phenomenon has been observed in the past:
- In the six months following the peak in January 2018, newcomers accounted for as much as 70%;
- In the seven months following the peak in November 2021, newcomers accounted for 60%.
However, in the 24 months following the January 2018 peak, the proportion of emerging and mature developers rose to 60%; In the 23 months following the November 2021 peak, the proportion of emerging and mature developers reached 70%.
Despite the overall decline in monthly active developers, how significant are the developers who have left?
Developers who remain in the crypto space submit more code and have more active days, with longer work experience than those who have left
In the crypto space, the vast majority of code submission contributions come from developers who remain in the field:
- About 25% of submissions are contributed by developers who left after July 2023
- 75% of submissions are contributed by developers who are still active in the field after July 2023
In the crypto space, retained developers tend to have longer work experience and more code submission days:
- For developers still working in the field, the median active weeks is 12 weeks, while the median active weeks for those who left the field is only 1 week;
- The median experience of retained developers in the crypto space is 21 months, while the median experience of those who left is only 5 months.
Since October 2022, the number of active developers in some ecosystems has increased
Here are some of the fastest-growing ecosystems with over 70 developers and a positive annual growth rate:
- Aztec Protocol: 168% annual growth rate, currently 76 monthly active developers
- Celestia: 145% annual growth rate, currently 81 monthly active developers
- Ripple: 18% annual growth rate, currently 172 monthly active developers
- TON: 8% annual growth rate, currently 126 monthly active developers
- ZKSync: 6% annual growth rate, currently 229 monthly active developers
- Starknet: 4% annual growth rate, currently 517 monthly active developers
We have updated the open-source crypto taxonomy, with more communities contributing to the open-source crypto taxonomy than ever before.
