State of the DevOps Market in 2024
DevOps has been around long enough now that people are already predicting its demise. In fact, some have posited that the DevOps engineer role is one (of many) that AI will eventually replace! Meanwhile, others argue that it’s not likely to happen in the near future.
The truth of the matter? DevOps is alive and well, and continues to thrive. The DevOps market exceeded $10 billion worldwide in 2023, according to Markets and Markets. The research firm also projects that global DevOps spending will grow to $25.5 billion between now and 2028, a compound rate of nearly 20% annually.
“The DevOps market in 2024 is growing, though differently than in past years,” Kumar Chivukula, CEO and co-founder of Opsera, tells The CTO Club. “Driven by the increasing demand for faster software delivery, improved collaboration, enhanced efficiency, and the integration of AI-assisted programming capabilities driven by tools like GitHub Copilot, organizations across industries are [continuing to embrace] DevOps practices.”
In this article, we’ll dig into what’s driving that continued growth – and how the DevOps market is evolving in 2024 and beyond.
Understanding the Concept of DevOps
To gain a clear picture of the DevOps market, it helps (of course) to understand just what the heck the term means.
At its inception, DevOps brought together two IT domains that were long treated as separate: Development and Operations. (Hence the name, a mashup of the two.)
The overarching goal: By bringing those functions into tighter alignment, organizations could deploy software (and updates) faster and more frequently, while also improving resiliency, performance, collaboration, efficiency, and other important requirements for success.
DevOps is not just a matter of technology and tools, but of people and processes – virtually any experienced DevOps practitioner will stress the importance of a healthy workplace culture, strong communication, continuous improvement, and other non-technical characteristics in order to be successful.
Over time, security has also become a key priority in DevOps environments, so much so that it spawned a reboot of the original term: DevSecOps. That reflects the goal of embedding security in the earliest phases of CI/CD pipelines and/or the software development lifecycle, which wasn’t always the case in most organizations.
The Current Market Scenario of DevOps
As it stands, DevOps is a multi-billion-dollar industry unto itself (as measured by spending on DevOps tools and services.) That $10 billion-plus figure above isn’t an outlier – other market research firms consistently publish comparable estimates. IMARC Group pegged global spending at $10.9 billion in 2023, for example.
A separate but related category also merits mention here: platform engineering. This newer discipline – which is actually one of the reasons some have predicted the “demise” of DevOps – was already approaching $5 billion in market size in 2022, according to Allied Market Research.
In brief, platform engineering refers to internal engineering teams building out platforms, services, and workflows for their organization’s software developers, DevOps teams, and other IT functions, typically with a heavy emphasis on reducing friction, speeding up delivery, enabling self-service, bolstering security, and other goals – a whole lot like DevOps.
Gartner has predicted that 80% of large software engineering organizations will have established platform engineering teams by 2026.
Growth Potential of The DevOps Market
As big as the DevOps market is today, it stands to get bigger – much bigger by most predictions. Multiple estimates expect a compound annual growth rate of approximately 20% for the better part of the next decade.
IMARC Group projects the global DevOps market will hit $63.4 billion in 2032, for example.
Just as interesting are some market research projects about newer classes of applications that are already making their way into DevOps toolchains, especially in terms of AI.
A recent IDC report focused on the Asia/Pacific region, for example, estimated that generative AI-based tools will be able to write 70% of software tests by 2028. AI will have similar impacts on other critical areas for software engineering teams, too: The same report predicted that in two years (2026), 45% DevOps/DevSecOps teams will use security tools that leverage AI to identify vulnerabilities in their applications and broader software supply chain.
Challenges and Opportunities in the DevOps Market
As DevOps continues to grow and mature, it remains full of opportunities – and some familiar challenges.
“The DevOps market has entered a new phase in its lifecycle, switching from initial fast growth to more long-term sustainable initiatives over the past few years,” says Ethan Sumner, CEO of DevEx Connect.
Sumner expects growth in DevOps-centric open-source projects, generative AI applications, and other areas. But as the saying goes, the more things change, the more they stay the same.
“The winds of change are blowing, and I predict a resurgence in the original goals of DevOps transformation and tooling in the coming years,” Sumner says. “I'm also optimistic about the surge in open-source commitments, increased investment, and the strengthening of global communities.”
Platform engineering is just one (big) example of how the original DevOps movement – and the multi-billion-dollar market it spawned – continues to evolve. But it’s not the only one, according to Chivukula from Opsera.
Chivukula expects that “in the next five years, DevSecOps will become the norm,” especially with increasing pressure from corporate boards, government regulations, and public perception to minimize security and compliance risks. He also expects to see the following:
- AI comes to DevOps: “Artificial intelligence and machine learning will automate more complex tasks, freeing up DevOps teams to focus on strategic initiatives.”
- Platform engineering isn’t a fad: “Platform engineering will become increasingly crucial, providing self-service platforms for developers and reducing the operational burden on DevOps teams with a focus on improving the developer experience to boost productivity and innovation.”
- Other disciplines will also grow: “Observability and AIOps will gain prominence in managing complex systems and predicting issues.”
- Traditional programming isn’t going extinct: “Low-code/no-code development won’t necessarily replace traditional development. These platforms will accelerate development cycles and democratize DevOps practices, all driven by the powerful advancements of AI coding and AI-assisted programming.”
Emerging opportunities will be attended by some familiar challenges, according to both Chivukula and Sumner, including tightening budgets, an increasingly complex security landscape, skills shortages, tool sprawl, and other issues.
Tools to Achieve Core DevOps Objectives
DevOps has long centered around a “holy trinity” of people, processes, and tools. Failing to prioritize all three usually increases the risk of sub-optimal or negative outcomes.
Within that context, DevOps experts typically refer to some common objectives – as Chivukula from Opsera did at the start of this article – including (but not limited to):
- faster delivery
- improved collaboration
- enhanced quality
- greater scalability
There is a mature and varied marketplace of tools DevOps teams use to achieve those and other objectives. Key categories of DevOps tooling and their uses and benefits include:
1. Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery (CI/CD) Tools
CI/CD tools are essential for automating the software development lifecycle and enabling faster, more frequent releases and updates. They help streamline the process from code integration to deployment, ensuring that code changes are automatically tested and deployed.
Popular Tools: Jenkins, GitLab CI, CircleCI, Travis CI, Opsera, Harness
Key Benefits: Accelerates the delivery pipeline, reduces manual errors, ensures consistent quality, and facilitates rapid feedback.
2. Configuration Management Tools
These tools automate the deployment and management of infrastructure, ensuring that environments are consistently configured across the development lifecycle. This category is also referred to as Infrastructure as Code (IaC).
Popular Tools: Ansible, Terraform, Chef, Puppet, SaltStack
Key Benefits: Automates repetitive infrastructure and operations tasks, reduces configuration drift, improves system reliability, and ensures compliance.
3. Containerization Tools
Containerization tools enable the creation of lightweight, portable, and self-sufficient containers that run consistently across various environments.
Popular Tools: Docker, Kubernetes, OpenShift
Key Benefits: Simplifies application deployment, enhances scalability, improves resource utilization, and facilitates microservices architecture.
4. Monitoring and Logging Tools
These tools provide real-time insights into the performance and health of applications and infrastructure, helping teams proactively identify and resolve issues.
Popular Tools: Prometheus, Grafana, ELK Stack (Elasticsearch, Logstash, Kibana), Splunk, Datadog, New Relic
Key Benefits: Enhances visibility, improves incident response times, supports proactive troubleshooting, and ensures system reliability.
5. Collaboration and Communication Tools
Effective collaboration and communication are critical to DevOps success. These tools facilitate seamless communication among team members, enhancing coordination and productivity.
Popular Tools: Slack, Microsoft Teams, Jira, Confluence
Key Benefits: Improves team collaboration, streamlines project management, and fosters a culture of transparency and continuous improvement.
6. Version Control Systems
Version control systems are fundamental to DevOps, providing a repository for code and enabling collaborative development.
Popular Tools: Git, GitHub, Bitbucket, GitLab
Key Benefits: Facilitates code collaboration, tracks changes, enables rollback, and supports branching and merging workflows.
7. Security and Compliance Tools
Integrating security into the DevOps pipeline – which is increasingly referred to as DevSecOps – is crucial for building secure applications and ensuring compliance with regulations such as HIPAA and GDPR.
Popular Tools: Snyk, Checkmarx, Aqua Security, Twistlock (There is a massive menu of security tools that could be considered as part of a DevOps toolchain. Some other tools and platforms listed in this section include embedded security capabilities.)
Key Benefits: Identifies vulnerabilities early, automates security checks, ensures compliance, and reduces risk.
Impact on The Market
The rise of these tools has significantly impacted the DevOps market by:
- Driving Adoption: The availability of robust DevOps tools has lowered the barriers to adoption, enabling organizations of all sizes to implement DevOps practices.
- Fueling Innovation: Continuous advancements and new features in DevOps tools drive innovation, allowing organizations to stay competitive and meet evolving customer demands.
- Enhancing Efficiency: Automation and integration capabilities of these tools enhance operational efficiency, reduce time-to-market, and improve product quality.
- Expanding Market Reach: The growth of cloud-based DevOps tools has expanded the market reach, making it accessible to a global audience and fostering a diverse ecosystem of solutions.
The Future of DevOps in the Digital World
Suffice it to say, DevOps continues to be a high-growth market, even if some of the terms and technologies inevitably change.
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