How tech workers actually feel about AI in 2026 | Annual AI sentiment survey (Noam Segal)

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.

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. Listen on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Podcasts In our in-depth conversation, we discuss: Why AI has split the tech workforce almost exactly in half—one half that’s thriving, another that’s shaken The four emotional archetypes defining tech workers right now the Energized, the Conflicted, the Disoriented, and the Resentful Why burnout has jumped an alarming 11 points in a single year Why nobody in tech would recommend their job to someone entering the industry today The 1 fear in tech right now it’s not job loss to AI Why managers are the single biggest lever for employee well-being Concrete advice for what employees and leaders can do right now Brought to you by: WorkOS —Make your app enterprise-ready, with SSO, SCIM, RBAC, and more Mercury —Radically different banking, now with Command Where to find Noam Segal: • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/noamsegal https://www.linkedin.com/in/noamsegal Referenced: • 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 • 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 • 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 • 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 • NPS Is The Worst: https://www.npsistheworst.com https://www.npsistheworst.com • The Terminator : https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088247 https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088247 • Skynet: https://terminator.fandom.com/wiki/Skynet https://terminator.fandom.com/wiki/Skynet • 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 • Devin: https://devin.ai https://devin.ai • 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 • Redeploying Fable 5: https://www.anthropic.com/news/redeploying-fable-5 https://www.anthropic.com/news/redeploying-fable-5 • 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 • 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 • 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 • 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 • 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 • 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 Production and marketing by https://penname.co/ https://penname.co/ . For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email email protected /cdn-cgi/l/email-protection 3848575c5b594b4c78545d5656414a595b50514c4b5341165b5755 . Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed.