For the past four years, recruiting firm Burtch Works has conducted a simple survey of data scientists with just one question: "Which do you prefer to use — SAS, R or Python". The results for this year's survey of 1,046 respondents are in:
- R: 40% (2016: 42%)
- SAS: 34% (2016: 39%)
- Python: 26% (2016: 20%)
Compared to last year's results, Python has gained 6 percentage points, mainly at the expense of SAS. (2016 results do not add to 100% due to rounding.) The trend for the commercial tool compared to the open-source tools is apparent looking at the data from all four years:
(Note: Python has only been an option for respondents in the last two surveys.) Demographic breakdowns, included in the survey analysis linked below, show that SAS remains popular with more years of experience (more than 16 years), although becomes less popular with greater educational attainment. Burtch Works will also be holding a mini webinar on June 29 to discuss the results (details at the link below).
Burtch Works: 2017 SAS, R, or Python Flash Survey Results