---
title: "The Most Popular AI Tools: What Developers Use and Why"
url: https://daily.dev/posts/the-most-popular-ai-tools-what-developers-use-and-why-h2lia0dkf
source_url: https://blog.jetbrains.com/ai/2026/02/the-most-popular-ai-tools-what-developers-use-and-why/
type: article
source: "JetBrains"
published: 2026-02-17T07:41:46.522Z
updated: 2026-02-17T07:42:10.084Z
tags: ["ai", "devtools", "github", "jetbrains"]
reading_time: 13
upvotes: 0
comments: 1
language: en
---

> ## Documentation Index
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# The Most Popular AI Tools: What Developers Use and Why

**[JetBrains](https://daily.dev/sources/jetbrains)** · 13 min read · 0 upvotes · 1 comments

## Summary

JetBrains' 2025 Developer Ecosystem Report reveals AI tools have become essential in software development, with GitHub Copilot, JetBrains AI Assistant, Cursor, Windsurf, and Tabnine leading adoption. Developers choose tools based on IDE integration quality, code accuracy, privacy guarantees, and pricing transparency. Usage patterns vary by region—North America favors mainstream tools, Europe prioritizes privacy, and China relies on domestic models like DeepSeek. Key barriers include security concerns, IP ownership uncertainty, and cost constraints. Developers want future tools to deliver higher code quality, deeper project context awareness, local processing options, and better explainability rather than just more features.

## Full article

daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: <https://blog.jetbrains.com/ai/2026/02/the-most-popular-ai-tools-what-developers-use-and-why/>

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---

Tags: [#ai](https://daily.dev/tags/ai), [#devtools](https://daily.dev/tags/devtools), [#github](https://daily.dev/tags/github), [#jetbrains](https://daily.dev/tags/jetbrains)

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