--- title: 996 | daily.dev description: A critique of the 996 work culture (9am-9pm, 6 days a week) promoted by some tech companies and founders. The author argues that while intensity and dedication... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/996-cgp3bzppf twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: 996 | daily.dev og:description: A critique of the 996 work culture (9am-9pm, 6 days a week) promoted by some tech companies and founders. The author argues that while intensity and dedication... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/996-cgp3bzppf og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/cgp3bzppF.png og:image:alt: 996 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # 996 **[Armin Ronacher](https://daily.dev/sources/mitsuhiko)** · 2 min read · 242 upvotes · 38 comments ## Summary A critique of the 996 work culture (9am-9pm, 6 days a week) promoted by some tech companies and founders. The author argues that while intensity and dedication matter, sustainable productivity comes from output rather than hours worked. Excessive work schedules lead to burnout and are particularly problematic when founders impose them on employees who lack the same risks and leverage. True success requires balancing professional commitment with personal life and well-being. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Community discussion Top comments from developers on daily.dev. **@tsumanu** · 22 upvotes > They promote and themselves will work mostly 4h daily 3-4 days a week. They said it only to threaten workers to work as long and as hard as possible and ditch broken gear and replace with someone else without even thinking their did something wrong. Just because they luxurious way of living requires sacrifices they aren't willing to make themselves **@peterwalkley** · 11 upvotes > "I should have spent more time at the office" - said no-one on their death bed ever. **@painbringer** · 8 upvotes > I find it alarming that we even have to discuss this insane work "culture". By the way, during almost 20 years of my career, I've seen (and worked with) people who can generate more output in a day than someone else over the whole week. There is much more when it comes to productivity than just hours. This whole "hustle mentality" is destroying people; instead of doing things like this, companies should try to build environments where everyone can work more efficiently. **@tilman151** · 6 upvotes > Apart from the whole "there is more to life" angle, is 996 really more productive? In my personal experience of 7 years coding professionally, I found the last 1-2h of the typical 9-5 rather unproductive. Long stretches of time were wasted by staring blankly at my screen. Often, I'd bang my head against a bug for several hours only to find it 10 minutes into the next workday, when I'm fresh. > > Right now, I am working 6.5h per day (because of kids) and I'm feeling as productive as my colleagues working the typical 8h. I'm just less available for meetings. I know not everybody can do that due to... **@gscarvalho** · 5 upvotes > In my personal opinion and experience - it's a type of modern slavery, so it's a trap. ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [AI is Making Us Work More](https://daily.dev/posts/ai-is-making-us-work-more-x2cfatmuy) · Hacker News · 2 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#productivity](https://daily.dev/tags/productivity), [#work-life-balance](https://daily.dev/tags/work-life-balance) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/996-cgp3bzppf) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"996","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/996-cgp3bzppf","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/996-cgp3bzppf"},"datePublished":"2025-09-06T12:50:21.360Z","dateModified":"2025-09-08T12:47:29.012Z","description":"A critique of the 996 work culture (9am-9pm, 6 days a week) promoted by some tech companies and founders. 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They said it only to threaten workers to work as long and as hard as possible and ditch broken gear and replace with someone else without even thinking their did something wrong. Just because they luxurious way of living requires sacrifices they aren’t willing to make themselves","datePublished":"2025-09-06T14:00:45.899Z","dateModified":"2025-09-07T06:16:33.258Z","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/cgp3bzppF#c-fkpBMnmOy","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Adrian","url":"https://daily.dev/tsumanu","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/s--bbTggVj0--/f_auto/v1729056978/avatars/avatar_o83yJZhDlLH2O7iL41pEg"},"interactionStatistic":{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":22}},{"@type":"Comment","text":"“I should have spent more time at the office” - said no-one on their death bed ever.","datePublished":"2025-09-07T11:52:44.885Z","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/cgp3bzppF#c-TlzhzSArB","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Peter Walkley","url":"https://daily.dev/peterwalkley","image":"https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/3225927?v=4"},"interactionStatistic":{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":11}},{"@type":"Comment","text":"I find it alarming that we even have to discuss this insane work “culture”. By the way, during almost 20 years of my career, I’ve seen (and worked with) people who can generate more output in a day than someone else over the whole week. There is much more when it comes to productivity than just hours. This whole “hustle mentality” is destroying people; instead of doing things like this, companies should try to build environments where everyone can work more efficiently.","datePublished":"2025-09-08T08:00:34.603Z","dateModified":"2025-09-08T08:11:13.611Z","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/cgp3bzppF#c-WjYqg5pIH","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Miroslav Lazovich","url":"https://daily.dev/painbringer","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/s--I2QesGBN--/f_auto/v1715387632/avatars/avatar_42CTXQp5uNhsKhJ4SVZGD"},"interactionStatistic":{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":8}},{"@type":"Comment","text":"Apart from the whole “there is more to life” angle, is 996 really more productive? In my personal experience of 7 years coding professionally, I found the last 1-2h of the typical 9-5 rather unproductive. Long stretches of time were wasted by staring blankly at my screen. Often, I’d bang my head against a bug for several hours only to find it 10 minutes into the next workday, when I’m fresh.\nRight now, I am working 6.5h per day (because of kids) and I’m feeling as productive as my colleagues working the typical 8h. I’m just less available for meetings. I know not everybody can do that due to costs of living, but for everyone else, I can highly recommend it.","datePublished":"2025-09-08T07:12:49.695Z","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/cgp3bzppF#c-EpL3ZCDXr","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Tilman Krokotsch","url":"https://daily.dev/tilman151","image":"https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/9466385?v=4"},"interactionStatistic":{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":6}},{"@type":"Comment","text":"In my personal opinion and experience - it’s a type of modern slavery, so it’s a trap.","datePublished":"2025-09-07T19:59:52.234Z","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/cgp3bzppF#c-jM2erQcjj","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Gislene Carvalho","url":"https://daily.dev/gscarvalho","image":"https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/a-/AOh14GhUDqRvi76B-yN62P-T2ZJdxUoQZetbhoqLEHAIDXc=s100"},"interactionStatistic":{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":5}}]} ```