It's crazy to think that I wrote the first version of this guide back in 2017 but 8+ years later it has stood the test of time quite well.
Like I do every year, I've made a few updates here and there to make sure it's still my best advice on how to become a Senior Developer in 2026.
This article is for those with a simple desire: You want to be considered a Senior Developer and you want to strive to be one of the best in your field.
The two groups of people who will benefit the most are:
All the developers, software engineers, coders and programmers out there who are looking to upgrade their skills and make a jump in their career after having had a few years in the industry
People still learning to code or junior developers who want to see a clear path of what's ahead of you if you want have a great career in programming
By the end of reading this, you will have a set path with a list of the skills you need to have and best resources to get them so that you can level up and become a Senior Developer.
Alternatively, I also put all of this into a step by step course you can follow if you want to fast-track your results:
Just a quick disclaimer before we dive in:
As with all things in life, you can always set your own path.
The one I'm going to share with you in this article is not be the only way to go from junior to senior dev. But it is the method that I have discovered in my own career and through the many conversations and interviews I've had with many respected Senior Software Engineers and Developers over the years.
I have assembled all of the commonalities and best practices for you into the steps below.
However... this post isn't really just an article on how to become a senior developer. It's a how to guide on optimizing your time with efficient and useful tools so that you get the most out of your life. That way you can take this sort of learning with you anywhere in the future.
Also, if you're someone who calls yourself a junior developer, please stop doing that and read this post as well.
Ok, for real this time, let's do this!
What is a Senior Developer?
Some people think you need to be a polyglot who can code in 10 different programming languages and have built your own version of Jarvis before you can be a senior developer.
But in reality, it's nowhere near as complicated. A senior dev is mainly just someone who brings an incremental benefit to the table.
They:
Make people around them better
Think higher-level and is able to have a long-term vision
Is able to communicate clearly and effectively with their teams
Comes to the table with solutions to problems rather than just identifying them
Consistently delivers and produce business value
You can know all the cool functional programming techniques in the world but if you are unable to communicate well with your team or you don't focus on delivering actual value to a customer, you are not a senior developer.
You need the whole package.
To be able to use your experiences to provide real benefit to the stakeholders.
What skills do you need to become a Senior Developer?
If you are able to actively work on the skills below, you will be miles ahead of everybody else and be able to get hired as a Senior Developer.
I call this set of skills, The Developer’s Edge.
So let me explain...
There will always be people with more experience than you in a field. It's just a fact of life. However, if you can work smarter and in a more efficient manner to accumulate different combinations of skills, then you can easily set yourself apart.
I's very rare in life that you require just one skill and succeed. Especially in a field like technology where things are constantly changing (who knows what Machine Learning Engineers will be doing in 5 years?). This is why you need to have a diverse set of transferable skills that will make you adaptable.
So let's break them down
Learn more than just technical skills
The first thing that comes to mind for most people, (and it's obviously an important piece of the puzzle), are languages and tech skills. And don’t get me wrong, you do need technical skills and you can’t fake it.
However, it's also super important to be strategic in how you think about what skills to focus on.
What I mean by this is that senior developers spend a lot of time understanding the WHY of a technology before they ever choose:
Why does this problem exist?
Why does this framework exist?
What problem is this library solving?
As a developer, you need to have a good sense of all of the tools and ideas that can benefit the development lifecycle and only then do you pick the tools that will have the biggest positive gain on a project.
This means that instead of focusing on every single new release feature of this super fancy testing framework, they focus on the pros and cons of each testing framework when trying to solve a real problem for their company/client. They ask questions like ‘What can be improved in our Continuous Delivery process to provide a better product?”
They also understand HOW things are connected.
To get started on thinking like this, mind mapping is a great tool to get familiar with, as it can really push your learning to the next level.
For example
Once you have a good grasp on the tooling and technology in your industry, you could create a mind map of what problems products face as they scale and when premature optimization is a bad thing.
By having this connection in your head of all of the above, you’re then able to focus the resources of your company on the things that matter most by having a broad view instead of a narrow focus. Here is how I have used mind mapping in the past:
Learn Data Structures and Algorithms
You need to start learning about data structures, algorithms and other computer science topics.
Why?
Because although frameworks and technologies change, the main principles in computer science (mostly) stay the same.
This means that by understanding these higher level topics and fundamentals, you are able to see that most software problems and good practices are generally constant throughout different languages and time.
This book by Rob Conery and this course by fellow ZTM instructor Yihua Zhang, are probably the best resources I have found to level up your skills in this:
Stay up to date with the industry
You also need to be aware of whats going on in your industry. However, that doesn't mean you need to read every single blog post that comes out. Rather just read curated newsletters so you can pick up the most important info.
We have 3 different newsletters here you can follow:
These will help you stay current on the present issues and future outlook of the whole industry.
Improve your team skills
This is an often overlooked skill:
How do you work with team members?
Are you brash and opinionated with PR (pull request) reviews and contribute to a toxic culture?
Or are you considerate, cooperative and encouraging of your team members?
Senior developers don’t have large egos, because they know they are good and don’t need to prove themselves to others. They write clean, simple code rather than code to try and show off their skills which is unreadable and ultimately detrimental to the other team members and their company.
And most importantly, they're willing to help others and they are willing to ask questions when they don’t know something.
This is where emotional intelligence and soft skills comes in.
![Learning to Meditate [Productivity & Focus]](https://images.ctfassets.net/aq13lwl6616q/2a7NI2zgRFphCk8pnDHBYF/34433f9991c8952427f112d428014bc6/Meditation_Thumbnail_2-_Academy.png?w=600&h=335&q=50&fm=webp&bg=transparent)
Social psychology is such an important tool to improve this skill and there is nothing better than the famous book: How to Win Friends and Influence People.
Remember what I said earlier. One of the key factors that makes a senior dev, is how they help improve the people around them.
If you have 5 people on your team, 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 should equal greater than 5 because you make those around you better. (I'm getting evil eyes from math purists now… I shall move on).
If you are the type of person that any project you get put on, or any team that you are a part of, you are able to get along with your teammates and make others work well together, you’re already miles ahead of most people.
You also make managers, directors, scrum masters, and CTO’s lives easier, so if you're doing this, you're providing a lot of value to a company and this a sure fire way to get promoted and earn a higher salary.
Improve your communication skills
Are you able to talk to a client or user and clearly see what their needs are? When they suggest something to you, do you understand what problems they are facing?
A senior developer is somebody that can be left alone with a client and can be a great listener, and then offer advice on what the best steps are to move forward.
They are also great at forming relations. They are not a pushover, but they don’t push their opinions on the client. They also understand that the goal is a non zero sum game where both client and developers gain from the interaction.
Have a read through this book to work on this skill.
Finally, you need to be able to explain complex programming concepts to a non-technical person. Start developing this skill by watching great instructors break down complex topics.
Here is my favourite instructor:
And my second favourite:
Notice how although they are teaching difficult topics, but it's easy to follow along and understand. Both aspects of great communicators.
Never stop learning
Senior developers are always learning something new each day. That doesn’t mean they spend 14 hours a day sitting in front of a computer reading articles. They are more efficient than that.
They are always looking to speak to other developers, ask questions, or explore new topics.
They don’t focus on just one skill set. You can be the best in the world at making one thing, but if you don’t know the whole spectrum or have a general understanding of what problem you are solving, you are no longer the best.
They have a growth mindset, believe that intelligence is malleable, and they believe in deliberate practice.
They understand that learning everything is impossible and they choose to spend their time on things they enjoy and things that matter most.
They don’t just say “Oh I hate this library!”. Most of the time, people who say these sort of things hate something because they don’t fully understand it.
For example
Don’t just say “I hate jQuery. Only bad developers still use jQuery” and sound pompous.
A Senior Developer might say something like “jQuery was instrumental in the development of the web and the popularity of JavaScript but isn't as useful to my current project”.
They have opinions that can be changed because they enjoy learning from others and they try new concepts before they decide they “hate” something.
Pick up some sales and interview skills
Although sales and negotiation may be seen as sleezy to some, it is a valuable skill that you need to acquire. This is because senior developers need to be able to communicate and sell themselves to people making those decisions.
I don't mean selling as such, but more selling and understanding the concepts:
You're able to see the needs of your employer or business and understand what they want
You can instill confidence and 'sell them' on the idea that you are the person to solve their problems
This skill also helps you to ask for promotions or roles that challenge you, so it's definitely worth having.
Ramit Sethi has a great article to get you started. Although it talks about salary negotiation, some of the principles can be applied to other scenarios.
I also have a course on this:
Be active in the community
Senior developers contribute to the developer community, whether it be by doing tech talks, speaking at meet-ups, contributing to open source, or even writing articles.
For example
I recently released a free mini workshop on how to NOT to get replaced by AI:
It answers questions like:
Should I learn how to use A.I. tools?
Can these AI tools actually help us learn more efficiently?
Are we going to be taken over by robots soon?
How can we best adapt to this changing environment?
How can we stand out and not get replaced?
By sharing information with the industry, you broaden your horizons and ideas while also becoming a better communicator.
You have to enjoy what you do!
If you are able to actively work on these skills, you will set yourself apart immediately. However, I have left the most important topic out of this list:
You have to enjoy what you are doing!
If you don’t enjoy learning everyday about computer science and software development, it will make it very hard to become a senior developer because you won’t have the drive to continue to improve over the long term.
If you have ever read So Good They Can’t Ignore You then you understand that passion has been over-hyped.
Real passion comes after you have mastered a skill. You have worked hard to become proficient and a leader in a field. You have developed those skills and now the respect and the benefit you provide to others pushes you to become better and better to get more of these good feelings.
That’s how you develop passion for work that you do.
Conclusion
If you've learned to code and are looking for the next step in your career, you need to think differently:
How are you going to stand out?
How are you going to grow?
How are you showing that you're helping solve real problems and providing value?
You don't become a senior developer by doing the easy things. It's by doing the things that push and challenge your mind and comfort level. You learn and you adapt day by day just like you did when you your wrote that first line of code.
Each step will be small, but over days, weeks, and years, small steps turn into miles. So never stop reading and never stop learning, but also know what’s a valuable use of your time and what isn’t.
And remember:
If you want to fast-track your progress from junior to senior developer, check out my roadmap course:
I walk you through the entire steps I mentioned above if you want everything in one place, as well as provide help and support in our private Discord.
Best articles. Best resources. Only for ZTM subscribers.
If you enjoyed Andrei's post and want to get more like it in the future, subscribe below. By joining over 500,000 ZTM email subscribers, you'll receive exclusive ZTM posts, opportunities, and offers.
No spam ever, unsubscribe anytime
