Ada is back in the TIOBE Index top 20

The March edition of the TIOBE Index shows Ada in the top 20, hitting position 18. This shows a renewed interest in Ada, perhaps due to the increased interest in memory-safe languages and software safety and correctness in general.

Memory safety bugs pose a significant threat to the security and reliability of critical software systems, with major tech companies like Google and Microsoft attributing over 70% of their security vulnerabilities to these issues. Addressing memory safety at the programming language level is essential for mitigating these risks, and as systems and technologies in critical industries become more complex, the requirement for software supply chain security will only increase.

The TIOBE index is updated once a month and the ratings are based on the number of skilled engineers worldwide, courses, and third-party vendors. Popular websites Google, Amazon, Wikipedia, Bing, and more than 20 others are used to calculate the ratings.

Beyond this great score for Ada in March, it’s interesting to look at the general trends over the past five years. You can clearly see the renewed interest in Ada. In addition, PYPL (another programming language popularity index) shows a similar trend.