A ranking by analyst firm RedMonk reflects on Python’s continued popularity as a leading enterprise programming language for a number of reasons. According to a recent study by RedMonk, JavaScript also remains widely popular as the web development programming language of choice for a significant number organizations.

In many ways, Python’s strong showing in the ranking — drawn from GitHub pull requests and Stack Overflow data — indicates its long-term viability among DevOps developers.

“One lack of change that is worth surfacing is Python’s number-two spot,” Stephen O’Grady, a RedMonk co-founder and analyst writes in The RedMonk Programming Language Rankings: January 2021. “Java was extremely hot on Python’s heels – and was, in fact, closer to the number-one ranking than to PHP behind it – but Python’s ability to defend its new high ranking is notable.”

Python’s prolonged high ranking is notable because of its versatility, Rachel Stephens, a RedMonk analyst who is responsible for the RedMonk Language Rankings’ design, told DevOps.com. “The breadth of use cases — and associated libraries that support those use cases — means there are a number of possible entry points for developers. The number of toeholds for the language within the enterprise helps its ubiquity,” said Stephens.

There also remains much discussion about what accounts for Python’s continued popularity beyond the scope of the study. A popular subject in forums, including Reddit, Python is typically described as highly versatile, relatively easy-to-learn and a simple, yet elegant language. While not cited in the RedMonk study, some software engineers and coders — such as this writer — appreciate how Python can make more intuitive sense, and is also less rigid compared to, say, a classic language such as C++. While JavaScript is largely used for web apps and scripts, of course, Python could arguably be the most popular language outside of the sphere of web development, thus accounting for its second-highest ranking in the study.

As such, “due to the accretive nature of our methodology, movement within the top-ranked languages is an infrequent occurrence,” Stephens said.

“[However], Python overtaking and sustaining its ranking over Java was a big deal. That said, we remain strong believers in the future of Java and the Java ecosystem, and we know there is a vast amount of enterprise Java that isn’t captured in the metrics we use,” Stephens said. “We don’t view Python’s ascendence as a zero-sum gain over the use of Java.”

For JavaScript, “in spite of all of the competition from up-and-coming languages, all the discussion of fragmentation – and even criticisms of JavaScript the language itself – it remains remarkably popular,” O’Grady said.

“Simply put, JavaScript remains – its detractors notwithstanding – a force of nature like no other within the industry, and there are no indications in the data that this is likely to change any time soon,” O’Grady added.

Meanwhile, in the book Hardcore Programming for Mechanical Engineers, published by No Starch Press, JavaScript trails Python in other rankings, while Python is also more popular than JavaScript for other reasons than those described in the RedMonk study. Python, for example, is cited as the ‘The Most Wanted Language,’ based on a Stack Overflow survey.

While Python is not the fastest language, as measured in benchmarks listed in Hardcore Programming for Mechanical Engineers — Go consistently outperforms it, for example, in execution times — Python’s popularity remains very high overall, according to the book’s author.

“These results are not surprising; Python is an extremely versatile and productive language,” author Ángel Sola Orbaiceta wrote. “Writing code in Python is a delight, and its standard library is well-equipped: for just about anything you want to do, Python has something ready to help.”