Web technologies improve really fast to ensure a convenient experience on the web for billions of Internet users. A well-programmed site or a web app can also provide its owners with the opportunity to develop their business efficiently and become highly profitable. A great part of the success depends on the chosen technology stack for web development, so experienced development teams always keep track of updates of the programming languages, frameworks, and databases to deliver the best possible solution for the client’s business.
In this article, we will talk about the best languages for web programming that are currently popular with developers.
5 Best Programming Languages for Web
There’s no actual competition between programming languages. Software specialists just choose the tool that’s primarily convenient for them. Still, some instruments become more trendy than others, so the popularity is the only criterion by which we made our list. In this part, we are going to describe the five most used languages for web development in 2020. This list specifies both front-end and back-end programming languages with their distinctive features, advantages, and disadvantages.
- a large development community;
- a programmer can run code on any computer, the main tools here is a browser;
- a specialist can easily optimize server interaction, for instance, by validating user input on the client side.
- has a steep learning curve;
- generates too many additional files, which isn’t favorable for small projects;
- a developer must hold in mind every attribute when working with classes.
According to the TIOBE index, Java is the leading language for web development. The main tools for Java programming now are Servlet API and the Java Server Pages or JSP technology. Servlet is a web-component that ensures the “request-response” interaction with a client side. It serves as an extension for Servlets that makes working with web content easier. JSP allows developers to divide the content into the static and dynamic one. By doing so, they can use the previously defined components multiple times.
- high popularity even though developers admit other languages to be more convenient;
- cross-platform orientation;
- a wide range of frameworks for any problem;
- low productivity, so there’s a need to find ways of optimization;
- some frameworks can be cumbersome and difficult to understand at first.
Python has a great number of web frameworks like Django, Flask, Tornado, etc. which makes web development faster. Developers most commonly prefer to use Django because it’s highly efficient as a full-stack framework, while Flask is the most popular solution for simple web apps with basic logic. Python is primarily used for server-side processing and routing. It helps developers work with HTTP requests, data storages, page templates, etc. The simplicity of Python made it also one of the most used languages for data science projects.
- simple and understandable syntax;
- a great variety of libraries;
- a specialist can build a solution using less code compared to other languages.
- the language has performance issues but can be optimized with the additional tools based on the project under development.
In 2009, Google officially released its Go programming language (or Golang). Now, it’s one of the fastest-growing languages for web programming. Go combines the best features of static and dynamic languages, including strict typing, high execution speed, flexibility, and a productive and reliable concept of parallel programming. It also handles parallel computations efficiently thanks to the so-called routines. They allow developers to create systems able to process hundreds and thousands of requests per second even if the server resources are minimal.
- the ability to create multiple threads;
- fast code execution and low memory consumption;
- the language is easy to learn.
- it’s a relatively new language, so the number of Go specialists available on the market is small;