Why Kotlin?

Kotlin has been around since 2011, a product of JetBrains, a company famously known for its top-notch Integrated Development Environments (IDE). Comprising of a strong, static, and inferred typing discipline, this language has been making waves in the tech world recently. At Google I/O 2017, Google declared Kotlin as the first-class language to develop Android apps, and StackOverflow’s Developer Survey results for the year 2019 show that Kotlin is the fourth fastest-growing and most loved language surpassing long time favorites Java and C++.

So, why Kotlin?

When saying the word “Kotlin”, one is reminded of a very popular “OG” language, Java. This is because usually at first glance, Kotlin looks like a pruned up version of Java. Well, it doesn’t stop there, Kotlin was initially designed to run on the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) and Android. This permitted Kotlin to use all the existing Java libraries, which means, if you are already proficient in Java, you can easily take advantage of the powerful features present in this language while being able to use the skills you’ve learned previously. Ballpark figures tell us that Kotlin entails 40% less code than Java. Amazing isn’t it? Well, this is all just the tip of the iceberg.

Does less code mean that Kotlin is less expressive?

Not at all. Speaking from experience, Kotlin is one of the most expressive languages out there. Standard library functions, data-types, keywords, syntax, etc. are really expressive therefore making it very easy to grasp. In comparison to many of the current most used languages (e.g Python, Java, C++) Kotlin offers higher developer ergonomics. This implies that the code is clean and concise thus increasing productivity, includes built-in support for concurrency, entails lower cognitive load, null pointer safety, type interference to name a few.

Kotlin and Android Development

In 2019 many leading companies such as Uber, Netflix, and Twitter shifted to Kotlin for Android development. With its many advantages (especially the developer ergonomics mentioned above), Kotlin is no doubt the future of android development. Even though cross-platform development with Kotlin is still not popular many predict that it would play a pivotal role in the future.

Are you still wondering “Why Kotlin?” I hope not.

Wanna get started? Kotlin documentation is a great place to start!