{"slug": "how-tech-workers-actually-feel-about-ai-in-2026-annual-ai-sentiment-survey-noam", "title": "How tech workers actually feel about AI in 2026 | Annual AI sentiment survey (Noam Segal)", "summary": "A new survey of thousands of tech workers reveals that AI has split the workforce nearly in half, with one group thriving and another shaken, while burnout jumped 11 points in a single year. The study identifies four emotional archetypes—Energized, Conflicted, Disoriented, and Resentful—and finds that few would recommend their job to newcomers. Managers are cited as the biggest lever for employee well-being.", "body_md": "**Noam Segal** is a longtime research leader across Airbnb, Meta, Twitter, Zapier, Intercom, and Figma, a certified coach, AI builder, and my community research lead. Together, we run the annual Tech Worker Sentiment Survey, now in its second year and one of the largest of its kind: a quantitative study of how people in tech actually feel about their jobs, AI, burnout, and the future of their careers. This year’s survey captured responses from thousands of workers across product, engineering, design, research, marketing, data, and sales, and the results are striking.\n\n**Listen on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Podcasts**\n\n### In our in-depth conversation, we discuss:\n\nWhy AI has split the tech workforce almost exactly in half—one half that’s thriving, another that’s shaken\n\nThe four emotional archetypes defining tech workers right now (the Energized, the Conflicted, the Disoriented, and the Resentful)\n\nWhy burnout has jumped an alarming 11 points in a single year\n\nWhy nobody in tech would recommend their job to someone entering the industry today\n\nThe #1 fear in tech right now (it’s not job loss to AI)\n\nWhy managers are the single biggest lever for employee well-being\n\nConcrete advice for what employees and leaders can do right now\n\n### Brought to you by:\n\n** WorkOS**—Make your app enterprise-ready, with SSO, SCIM, RBAC, and more\n\n** Mercury**—Radically different banking, now with Command\n\n### Where to find Noam Segal:\n\n• LinkedIn: [https://www.linkedin.com/in/noamsegal](https://www.linkedin.com/in/noamsegal)\n\n### Referenced:\n\n• How tech workers are feeling in 2026: a workforce splitting in two: [https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/how-tech-workers-are-feeling-in-2026](https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/how-tech-workers-are-feeling-in-2026)\n\n• How tech’s most resilient workers handle burnout: [https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/how-techs-most-resilient-workers](https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/how-techs-most-resilient-workers)\n\n• Please stop the AI Confidence Theater: [https://www.elenaverna.com/p/please-stop-the-ai-confidence-theater](https://www.elenaverna.com/p/please-stop-the-ai-confidence-theater)\n\n• Velocity over everything: How Ramp became the fastest-growing SaaS startup of all time | Geoff Charles (VP of Product): [https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/velocity-over-everything-how-ramp](https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/velocity-over-everything-how-ramp)\n\n• NPS Is The Worst: [https://www.npsistheworst.com](https://www.npsistheworst.com)\n\n• *The Terminator*: [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088247](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088247)\n\n• Skynet: [https://terminator.fandom.com/wiki/Skynet](https://terminator.fandom.com/wiki/Skynet)\n\n• Inside Devin: The world’s first autonomous AI engineer that’s set to write 50% of its company’s code by end of year | Scott Wu (CEO and co-founder of Cognition): [https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/inside-devin-scott-wu](https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/inside-devin-scott-wu)\n\n• Devin: [https://devin.ai](https://devin.ai)\n\n• An AI state of the union: We’ve passed the inflection point, dark factories are coming, and automation timelines | Simon Willison: [https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/an-ai-state-of-the-union](https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/an-ai-state-of-the-union)\n\n• Redeploying Fable 5: [https://www.anthropic.com/news/redeploying-fable-5](https://www.anthropic.com/news/redeploying-fable-5)\n\n• Why half of product managers are in trouble | Nikhyl Singhal (Meta, Google): [https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/why-half-of-product-managers-are-in-trouble](https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/why-half-of-product-managers-are-in-trouble)\n\n• Inside Linear: Building with taste, craft, and focus | Karri Saarinen (co-founder, designer, CEO): [https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/inside-linear-building-with-taste](https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/inside-linear-building-with-taste)\n\n• Building beautiful products with Stripe’s Head of Design | Katie Dill (Stripe, Airbnb, Lyft): [https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/building-beautiful-products-with](https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/building-beautiful-products-with)\n\n• The design process is dead. Here’s what’s replacing it. | Jenny Wen (head of design at Claude): [https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/the-design-process-is-dead](https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/the-design-process-is-dead)\n\n• OpenAI Codex lead on the new shape of product work | Andrew Ambrosino: [https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/openai-codex-lead-on-the-new-shape](https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/openai-codex-lead-on-the-new-shape)\n\n• Elon Musk: ‘Chances are we’re all living in a simulation’: [https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/jun/02/elon-musk-tesla-space-x-paypal-hyperloop-simulation](https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/jun/02/elon-musk-tesla-space-x-paypal-hyperloop-simulation)\n\nProduction and marketing by [https://penname.co/](https://penname.co/). For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email [[email protected]](/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#3848575c5b594b4c78545d5656414a595b50514c4b5341165b5755).\n\n*Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed.*", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/how-tech-workers-actually-feel-about-ai-in-2026-annual-ai-sentiment-survey-noam", "canonical_source": "https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/how-tech-workers-actually-feel-about", "published_at": "2026-07-12 12:32:14+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-07-12 12:45:29.882655+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["artificial-intelligence", "ai-ethics", "ai-policy"], "entities": ["Noam Segal", "Airbnb", "Meta", "Twitter", "Zapier", "Intercom", "Figma"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/how-tech-workers-actually-feel-about-ai-in-2026-annual-ai-sentiment-survey-noam", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/how-tech-workers-actually-feel-about-ai-in-2026-annual-ai-sentiment-survey-noam.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/how-tech-workers-actually-feel-about-ai-in-2026-annual-ai-sentiment-survey-noam.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/how-tech-workers-actually-feel-about-ai-in-2026-annual-ai-sentiment-survey-noam.jsonld"}}