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GitHub’s 2023 Octoverse found rapid growth in generative AI projects, continued expansion of open source participation, and a much larger volume of private repository activity. Its findings describe activity on GitHub from October 1, 2022, through September 30, 2023—not the entire software industry or all open source development.
What changed on GitHub in 2023?
GitHub’s Octoverse report describes three visible shifts: more generative AI projects and applications, wider use of cloud-native and automated workflows, and a large wave of first-time open source contributors. At the same time, private repositories made up most of the platform’s measured activity. The figures below are GitHub’s platform measures unless explicitly identified as survey findings.
Generative AI projects grew quickly
GitHub reported that generative AI projects on its platform grew 248% year over year in 2023. By the middle of that year, GitHub had seen more than twice as many generative AI projects as it had during all of 2022. Individual contributors to generative AI projects increased 148% year over year, according to GitHub.
The report also describes a shift from AI research projects toward application development: developers increasingly built user-facing products using pre-trained models and APIs. These repository trends indicate activity on GitHub; they do not measure every AI project or developer worldwide.
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AI coding tools were common among survey respondents
In a GitHub-sponsored 2023 developer survey summarized in the report, 92% of respondents said they were using or experimenting with AI coding tools, both inside and outside work. This is a survey result, not an estimate that 92% of all developers use such tools.
Open source contributions rose alongside private work
GitHub counted 301 million contributions to open source projects in 2023. The report also says private repositories increased 38% year over year and accounted for more than 81% of all GitHub activity. These measures show why GitHub’s public open source activity should not be mistaken for the whole platform: most measured activity was in private repositories.
Cloud-native and automated workflows expanded
GitHub reported 4.3 million public and private repositories using Dockerfiles in 2023, including more than one million public repositories using Dockerfiles to create containers. It also reported that public projects used 169% more GitHub Actions minutes than in the prior year. These indicators point to greater visibility of container-based development and automation in GitHub repository and product data.
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How to interpret the numbers
Octoverse is a snapshot of GitHub, not a census of software development. GitHub says its analysis uses anonymized user and product data for October 1, 2022, through September 30, 2023. The figures are historical and should not be read as current 2026 statistics.
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Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minuteDriver Scan →Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problemsFix Now →Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitchesFind Drivers →- Platform scope: Contribution, repository, and Actions figures describe activity recorded by GitHub, not all open source work or developer activity globally.
- Survey scope: The 92% AI-tools figure comes from a GitHub-sponsored survey and applies to its respondents, not every developer.
- AI project definition: GitHub identified AI projects using 683 repository topic terms, so the result reflects that classification method.
- Project popularity: GitHub used Mona Rank, a rank-based analysis of project community size and popularity, to analyze open source projects.
- Developer terminology: The report’s glossary defines developers as individual, non-spam GitHub accounts; for some platform measures it treats anyone with a GitHub account as a developer.
GitHub says a complete methodology can be requested from the company; the report does not provide every methodological detail.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Explore the data beyond the report
For readers who want to examine trends directly, GitHub’s Innovation Graph provides quarterly data dating back to 2020. Its measures include pushes, developers, organizations, repositories, programming languages, licenses, topics, and economic collaborators. It offers a way to explore GitHub’s activity data over time, with the same platform-scope caveat as Octoverse.
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