BlogsLow Code Report for 2022
Every sector’s reliance on software technologies is growing at an unprecedented pace and this year, we saw the trend continue.
The adoption of low-code has had a great impact as the technology continues to lower the barrier to entry by seamlessly fitting into the industry standard workflows. From automating engineering tasks to easily going from design to code - software professionals all over the world have been able to adopt these tools effortlessly. This has been reflected in the overall market growth as well.
According to SpreadsheetWEB, the industry for no-code development platforms is estimated to be worth USD 21.6 billion in 2022.
Overall Market
Source: SpreadsheetWEB
The market for low-code apps is relatively young but despite that, it is predicted to hit $187 billion by 2030, which puts the CAGR at roughly 31.1% which is a staggering number compared to other tech fields, as per the report by GlobeNewswire.
It is forecasted that by 2025 70% of the new applications will be built by low-code or no-code tools, which will undoubtedly boost the market. It is widely believed that the Covid pandemic has had a positive impact on the low-code market as teams were forced to be remote & agile.
Another factor, as per Mendix, is that developers are unable to meet the deadlines and as many as two-thirds of the projects are behind schedule. These factors have pushed teams to be more efficient & flexible, leading to the utilisation of low-code tools to accelerate development.
North America & APAC regions continue to be the biggest and fastest low-code markets. The Indian Low Code - No Code (LCNC) market currently comprises around 150 players with most of them being bootstrapped startups, as per Gartner.
Impact of Low Code on Businesses
Businesses have been struggling to bridge the gap between business needs & IT. As per Quandry, 72% of IT leaders state that their developers struggle to cope with deadlines which makes these tools a necessity for these companies & it is estimated that by 2024, 75% of enterprises will use at least four low-code platforms.
The rapid adoption of low-code tools is also fueled by the increase in software development costs due to salary hikes, inflation, and the gap between business demands and IT which causes trouble in hiring & retaining developers.
Source: Devox
As per G2, low-code tools have the potential to reduce development time by 90% and are much more of an economical choice, and by 2023, over 500 million digital apps and services will be developed and deployed using cloud-native approaches – the same number of apps developed in the last 40 years.
Moreover, in 2019, 41% of large enterprises in the US, UK, Canada, and Australia were using low-code platforms and the number has risen to 84% this year.
This has led businesses to create policies for citizen developers -- tech-savvy folks who create apps for themselves & others, using third-party tools. Gartner claims that over 80% of companies are looking to hire citizen developers who can create complex apps without diving deep into the code and technicalities associated with these apps.
Low-code leaders believe that these tools provide a solution to the rising costs of development faced by enterprises by helping them deliver with leaner teams. This is also reflected in numbers, as SpreadsheetWEB claims 60 out of the Fortune 100 companies are using low-code tools.
One of the biggest challenges faced by global technology leaders today is the shortage of technology talent. For every 10-15 open development jobs, there's one new CS graduate entering the market. This has fueled a 2x (and sometimes higher) jump in developer salaries, making it tough to hire and retain top talent, and scale organisations.
This is where low-code tools offer builders and organisations low friction means to ship products faster with lean teams, without compromising tech stack, code quality, and workflows.
In 2022 we have started seeing a shift from larger tech teams to much leaner teams of well-rounded product developers, assisted by AI and tools such as Locofy.ai, Github Copilot, and OpenAI that automate big chunks of frontend and backend code. We expect to see this trend become more mainstream in 2023 as organisations are pushed to do more with less.
While empowering the current generation of developers, low-code also offers the next generation of builders a new avenue for building products. We have seen students finish their school projects with Locofy.ai in a week, rather than a whole semester. We're bullish about low code playing an important role in the evolution of coding in the coming years.
Expect to see the next Airbnb or Uber built with a 10x leaner team, and AI, tools, and coding agents finding a permanent home in core product development teams.
Low Code in the Startup Ecosystem
Launching in-demand features in a fast-paced environment & reducing the time to market are typically a startup’s biggest challenges. Low-code tools help startups build enterprise-level solutions & both consumer-facing and internal apps in record times without spending a huge dime on engineering efforts.
For example, Zendesk has been using Airtable for its special offering for startups. This has led to a whopping 233% increase in referrals from partnerships for Zendesk. Another interesting example would be Calendly. They use Zapier to connect Zendesk to Airtable, allowing their support team to send customer feedback to the product team automatically.
Due to the efficiency, control over the code quality & stack, and more customisation, low code tools are in demand more than ever. For instance, Supabase raised $80M Series B, and similarly, Retool raised $45 million at a valuation of $3.2 billion in 2022.
Source: Statista
Many startups like Airtable and Locofy.ai have provided solutions that help conglomerates & startups be agile and move faster. Locofy.ai, in particular, has been used by top developers globally to go from design to production-ready code using AI.
Therefore, startups are able to move faster with quick time to market, building reliable & scalable solutions while being economical, thanks to the no-code and low-code tools at their disposal. Startup entrepreneurs have been relying more and more on these tools as you can see from a comment by Tom Peel, the founder of The Overhear app and a Locofy user.
I've been using low code since about November this year (2022) so not very long at all. Our main codebase has been outsourced and that's what is currently live, but I imagine low-code will bring it all in-house within the next 12 months for us if we can get over the current hurdle of connecting it to our existing Firestore database. We also expect to move 3-4 times faster with our lean in-house team in 2023 using low-code tools.
Predictions & Trends to Look Out for in 2023
Artificial Intelligence
This year ends with OpenAI showcasing how far AI has come and the trend should continue in 2023 as well with more users adopting & making AI-powered tools like ChatGPT a core part of their workflow.
Content generation & management tools like Copy.ai have been using AI aggressively and more tools in this space are expected to incorporate AI features.
GitHub Copilot, which is essentially an AI pair programmer, conducted research that showed that developers who used GitHub Copilot completed the task significantly faster–55% faster than the developers who didn’t use GitHub Copilot.
Recently, OpenAI’s ChatGPT which lets developers solve complex problems and generate code, crossed 1 million users in less than a week demonstrating the power of combining AI with low code tools & the widespread reach of these tools. These tools complement one another and when used in conjunction, you can gallop through the development process.
For instance, using Locofy.ai to go from design to pixel-perfect frontend code and then extending it using ChatGPT and Copilot can lead to a full-stack, complex app in a matter of few hours, which would otherwise cost you at least 1000 hours of development time.
Application Builders
With the rapid adoption of new features, the time to market has been critical. The year 2022 was marked by the rise of popular low-code app builders that offer extensible code, comprehensive features, and a host of integrations out-of-the-box.
With the rise in remote teams and more diverse business requirements, these low-code platforms offer a quick way to build internal tools, test prototypes, and experiment & validate new ideas. Moreover, Gartner predicts that by 2024, 80% of apps will be built by non-developers.
However, these low-code tools are not limited to simple apps, 41% of developers want to build more complicated, feature-rich apps. That’s where low-code tools like Locofy.ai, Anima, and TeleportHQ come in. This is what Deyson Ortiz, a Locofy user, has to say about his experience using the tool:
Locofy has been an incredibly helpful tool to help me take my design creations from Figma to live in a short amount of time. For example, I needed to create some Re-motion Animations, Resoc Image Templates, and a site mockup and Locofy helped save me time from having to code -- helping me build 3 to 6 times faster. It's a huge time saver and also a great way to learn new languages such as React.
Increase in Collaboration
Remote work has changed how companies work and collaborate forever, with more & more companies switching to a remote/hybrid model.
A recent study by Upwork predicted that 73% of all departments will have remote workers in the near future and as per Owl Labs’ State of Remote Work 2021 report, 38% of employees say their company has invested in video setups to enhance remote collaboration.
Many renowned companies such as Airbnb & Coinbase have gone remote. We, at Locofy, are fully remote as well & collaborate virtually.
Low-code application development platforms enable the collaboration between business users, developers, and IT in a single environment. This allows organizations to build and innovate critical applications more efficiently and effectively. By using visual models to capture business requirements, the platform allows for quick iteration and scaling of apps while ensuring clear communication between all parties. This trend to support remote collaborations should continue in 2023 as well.
Cloud Computing
As per Gartner, cloud computing global revenue totaled $474 billion in 2022 & is the cornerstone of new digital experiences, and their vice president says “The technological and organisational silos of application development, automation, integration, and governance will become obsolete”, which will boost the low-code market.
No-code tools have led to a rise in citizen development. Companies like Vercel and Netlify have already simplified not only deployment but also the CI/CD pipeline to build high-availability apps.
By 2025, Gartner estimates that over 95% of new digital workloads will be deployed on cloud-native platforms, up from 30% in 2021.
Closing Remarks
Companies are outsourcing key processes to low-code platforms at a breakneck pace and as per a KPMG study, 26% of company leaders say these tools are their utmost significant investment. These factors make these low-code tools high in reward and 85% of the users have admitted to the value these tools provide
What’s more, is that the adoption of low-code is spreading all over the world and not restricted to a single country due to their economical nature, low barrier to entry, and intuitive UI of them. Locofy.ai, for example, is used by builders in more than 180 countries.
The low-code market looks very promising as these tools provide a lot of value to businesses, especially since many struggle to hire & retain good talents. These low code tools thus enable teams to be more agile, and collaborative to ship faster.
