Most Popular Backend Frameworks – 2012/2023

With 2023 also comes new videos and new analysis. In fact, in this new article we analyze the Most Popular Backend Frameworks (2012/2023). That is the evolution of the most popular Backend Frameworks from January 2012 to January 2023 (last available update). The data in the video are calculated based on the stars in the GitHub archive. But in the article we will see and analyze other parameters as well. Most Popular Backend Frameworks – 2012/2023.

Most Popular Backend Frameworks 2023

But let’s start first by answering a question. What are Backend Frameworks? Backend frameworks are server-side programming language libraries that help build the backend structure of a website. Backend frameworks provide ready-made components to develop a dynamic web application. (Source: Kelltontech).

Having said that, the next question is this. What are the most popular Backend Frameworks from 2012 to 2022? Which ones lead the ranking? In the video below you can see the top 15 from the last ten years. Below I will break down the data from the last few years.

Most Popular Backend Framework January 2023

In the video above we saw the evolution of the Most Popular Backend Frameworks from January 2012 to January 2022. But what are the top Backend Frameworks in the first month of 2023? In the lead with the highest “vote” is Laravel. Laravel has 71,903 repository stars from users. Django has 67.941 and Spring is third with 64.405. In the last two years Django has managed to overtake Flask and keep the second position. Then we find Flask with 61,331, ExpressJS with 59,132 and NestJS with 53,209. There are a total of ten backend frameworks with over 40,000 repository stars. Among them also NestJS, Meteor and Strapi. Closing out the top 15 are Koa, Beego, Symfony, Iris, Coldegniter and .net core with 18,230.

Top 5 Backend Development Frameworks in 2023

  1. Lavarel
    Laravel is an open source MVC framework written in PHP for web application development, created in 2011 by Taylor Otwell as a derivation of Symfony.

Distributed under an MIT license, it maintains all available code on GitHub and is listed, based on GitHub and StackOverflow scores, as the most popular PHP framework, followed by Symfony, CodeIgniter and others; as of August 2014 it is the most followed PHP project on GitHub.

Some of the features are: a modular package management system with a dedicated dependency manager, different ways to access relational databases, tools that help deployment and maintenance of the application, and its arrangement at Syntactic sugar.

2. Django
Django is a high-level Python Web framework that encourages rapid development and clean, pragmatic design. Built by experienced developers, it takes care of much of the hassle of Web development, so you can focus on writing your app without needing to reinvent the wheel. It’s free and open source.

Ridiculously fast.
Django was designed to help developers take applications from concept to completion as quickly as possible.

Reassuringly secure.
Django takes security seriously and helps developers avoid many common security mistakes.

Exceedingly scalable.
Some of the busiest sites on the Web leverage Django’s ability to quickly and flexibly scale.

3. Spring

The Spring Framework provides a comprehensive programming and configuration model for modern Java-based enterprise applications – on any kind of deployment platform.

A key element of Spring is infrastructural support at the application level: Spring focuses on the “plumbing” of enterprise applications so that teams can focus on application-level business logic, without unnecessary ties to specific deployment environments.

4. Flask

Flask is a micro web framework written in Python. It is classified as a microframework because it does not require particular tools or libraries. It has no database abstraction layer, form validation, or any other components where pre-existing third-party libraries provide common functions. However, Flask supports extensions that can add application features as if they were implemented in Flask itself. Extensions exist for object-relational mappers, form validation, upload handling, various open authentication technologies and several common framework related tools.

Applications that use the Flask framework include Pinterest and LinkedIn.

5. Express JS

Express.js, or simply Express, is a back end web application framework for Node.js, released as free and open-source software under the MIT License. It is designed for building web applications and APIs. It has been called the de facto standard server framework for Node.js.

The original author, TJ Holowaychuk, described it as a Sinatra-inspired server, meaning that it is relatively minimal with many features available as plugins. Express is the back-end component of popular development stacks like the MEAN, MERN or MEVN stack, together with the MongoDB database software and a JavaScript front-end framework or library.

Sources: Wikipedia; Company sites

Most used web frameworks among developers worldwide – 2022

In addition to the above data, there is other interesting data on the most widely used web frameworks by developers around the world. In a survey that the website Statista conducts every year (commissioned by StackOverflow) over 58 thousand sofware developers were interviewed. The developers were asked which framework is the most used.

Statistic: Most used web frameworks among developers worldwide, as of 2022 | Statista
Find more statistics at Statista

In first position among the most used web frameworks in 2022 is Node.js used for 47.12% of respondents. In second position, however, we find React.js with 42.62% and in third position, on the third step of the podium, jQuery with 28.57%. Next we find Express, Angular with values above 20 percent and then between 15 and 20 percent Vue and ASP.Net.

Sources and useful links

To view the video on YouTube: https://youtu.be/S9JcI254DZI

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