Low-Code Adoption Surges Amid Pandemic, Becoming Vital for Businesses and IT Leaders

A groundbreaking study by Mendix, a global leader in low-code application development, explores the significant acceleration in low-code adoption among IT leaders and developers as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. The study confirms that a whopping 77% of enterprises across six countries have adopted low-code platforms, with 75% of IT leaders acknowledging low-code as a trend they can't afford to miss.

Low-code, which facilitates the rapid creation of cloud-native applications for web and mobile, emerged as a key player in meeting the fast-changing needs and demands during the global pandemic. The Mendix report, titled The State of Low-Code 2021: A Look Back, The Light Ahead, shows that 58% of IT professionals are excited instead of worried about digital disruption, and for 45%, the pandemic has intensified the need for quicker and more collaborative development.

As businesses increasingly demand innovative software solutions, the study reveals:

Low-code platforms, such as Mendix and AppMaster, enable IT departments to democratize software development, empowering non-technical staff to contribute and ease the pressure on their IT colleagues. As a result, during the pandemic, 64% of organizations relied on non-technical employees for development assistance. The study also discovered that:

Reports predict that the worldwide low-code developer population will grow at a 40.4% compound annual growth rate from 2021 to 2025, more than three times the rate of developers in general. The adoption of low-code not only results in more collaboration, faster development, and lower costs, but also has the power to diversify talent pools by making software development accessible to people from various backgrounds and skillsets. As such, Gartner predicts that by 2024, 80% of technology products and services will be built by non-IT professionals.

Among users of low-code platforms, these platforms are no longer limited to traditional tasks like data modeling and visualization but are increasingly being utilized for mission-critical applications. Furthermore, over half (56%) of employees in organizations that use low-code are employing apps built on low-code platforms. These platforms free up software development teams to tackle new projects, with 51% of developers stating that half of their daily development work could be accomplished using low-code platforms.

The use of low-code platforms is particularly gaining traction in the United States, with 80% of organizations having already adopted the technology, compared to 75% in China and 74% in Europe. However, 90% of Chinese IT professionals are eagerly embracing low-code with future projections suggesting that China could overtake the U.S. as the global low-code leader.

Despite its numerous benefits, potential barriers to low-code adoption still exist. For 31% of U.S. organizations, the main obstacle is reliance on legacy systems for core and mission-critical workloads. Additionally, reluctance among IT and business decision-makers constitutes another challenge, especially in the United States, compared to global statistics.

The recent Mendix-commissioned research highlights the pandemic's impact on low-code adoption, usage, and benefits, shedding light on its growing importance in the rapidly evolving software development landscape.