Ask HN: Why Did Python Win? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Why Did Python Win?

#11

Post by cyanmagenta » Mon, Dec 22, 2025, 4:11 PM UTC

There is a network effect with programming languages. Once you get popular, more people write libraries and guides for that language, which in turn makes it even more popular.

If you were czar of the universe and could start from scratch, could a better scripting language be created? Sure. But that’s not the fact pattern, and Python isn’t bad enough at what it does to warrant starting over.

Re: Ask HN: Why Did Python Win?

#12

Post by apothegm » Mon, Dec 22, 2025, 4:11 PM UTC

So much easier to pick up than Perl. Even for an experienced programmer, let alone a new learner. And the rich standard library.

Re: Ask HN: Why Did Python Win?

#13

Post by biasafe_belm » Mon, Dec 22, 2025, 4:12 PM UTC

You can't only look at it from the perspective of a software engineer. Ordinary people can read and write Python much more easily than a ton of other languages. It's very easy to get started, with basically no ceremony. Highly tolerant of user errors yet still allows one to grow with the language (nobody writes ABCs on their first day).

Python has issues, but those issues don't matter equally to everyone and every use case. Low barrier to entry, coupled with Metcalfe's law, explains a lot IMO.

I love Scheme, but not everybody does, and I can see why.

Re: Ask HN: Why Did Python Win?

#14

Post by JodieBenitez » Mon, Dec 22, 2025, 4:12 PM UTC

> it happened to look a bit better than Perl. Which is absurd to me.

It's not absurd, it's a debatable point. I think being easy to read is definitely a desirable quality for any language, especially for adoption. Some are better than others in this field.

Re: Ask HN: Why Did Python Win?

#15

Post by networked » Mon, Dec 22, 2025, 4:13 PM UTC

Previously:

- Perl's decline was cultural - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46175112 - Dec 2025 (460 comments)

- (!) Ask HN: Why did Python win? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37308747 - Aug 2023 (839 comments)

- Ask HN: Why is Python so popular for ML/DS? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16207834 - Jan 2018 (19 comments)

- Ask HN: Is Python dying? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11100251 - Feb 2016 (352 comments)

- Python is now the most popular introductory language at top U.S. universities - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8001337 - July 2014 (362 comments)

- Ask HN: Why Python over Ruby? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=682101 - July 2009 (196 comments)

- Ask HN: What does Ruby have that Python doesn't? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=283639 - Aug 2008 (223 comments)

Re: Ask HN: Why Did Python Win?

#16

Post by kibbber » Mon, Dec 22, 2025, 4:13 PM UTC

Hopefully RAM prices continue to increase so that we are forced to rediscover the lost art of software efficiency and optimisation.

Re: Ask HN: Why Did Python Win?

#17

Post by madduci » Mon, Dec 22, 2025, 4:13 PM UTC

netcraft wrote: post #6

I think the reason python won was that it was easy to learn and read and was batteries included. vs perl: People need to solve their problems, not fight with syntax Theres a lot of network effects as well. The more people were using it, the more people will use it.

I don't believe the "syntax win" scenario. Python is also ugly, due to the required indentation, like yaml.

I believe more in the ecosystem, specifically how the computer vision and machine learning movements have adopted python extensively as frontend language (the heavy weightlifting is still doing in C++). The exploit of numpy has brought many many use cases into the language as well.

Re: Ask HN: Why Did Python Win?

#18

Post by globular-toast » Mon, Dec 22, 2025, 4:15 PM UTC

Because it's really enjoyable to use. If you are doing something where you can use Python, ie. you can afford the performance hit, it's hard to find reasons to not like it. Common Lisp has it all, but for some reason people can't cope with the parens. People just genuinely enjoy using Python.

Re: Ask HN: Why Did Python Win?

#19

Post by Workaccount2 » Mon, Dec 22, 2025, 4:15 PM UTC

Non-swe, classic engineer here

Python is easy to learn and has an extensive library catalog. It also has massive support available online. That's why I have chosen it in the past when I needed to write basic programs for work.

With the rise of LLMs, python is now even more attractive as LLMs really excel at writing it.

Re: Ask HN: Why Did Python Win?

#20

Post by codebyaditya » Mon, Dec 22, 2025, 4:15 PM UTC

Python optimized for C-interop (NumPy) just as data science exploded. While Perl won text processing, Python became the universal interface for C libraries. That ecosystem lock-in—not syntax—is why it won. It was the right glue at the right time.