Developer survey data published in 2026 shows engineers spending an average of 11.4 hours a week reviewing AI-generated code, compared with 9.8 hours writing new code from scratch. That shift explains why so many predictions about AI replacing software engineers have missed the mark. "AI won't replace software developers but developers who use AI will replace those who don't," GitHub CEO Thomas Dohmke said while discussing Copilot's role in software engineering. What actually changedThe common thread behind nearly every prediction about AI replacing software engineers is the assumption that programming was fundamentally about writing code. Writing code happened to be the most repetitive part of a much broader discipline involving design, systems thinking, debugging, testing, architecture and judgment.