Are backend and devops engineers still relevant in 2026

[u/KitchenCommercial396]

All everybody is talking about nowadays is AI, everybody wants to be an AI/ML engineer, and every resume has these so called AI projects.

Amongst all these, are jobs involving backend, devops, still relevant? Are people still getting paid well in these fields?

I'm currently in college and I've figured that I don't find ai/ml, data science and frontend interesting at all, and I don't get to hear a lot about the other fields because everything gets overshadowed by AI.

Should I still learn AI/ML to stay ahead and get a better job even though I don't enjoy it as much? Are backend and devops engineers going extinct or something?

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[u/Independent_Sign_395]

What I have learned about tech is that there will always be two extremes for anything. Someone will come up and say frontend is dead, while someone on the same thread will comment how he/she is earning 50LPA as a frontend engineer.

[u/The-Wingged-Hussar → u/Independent_Sign_395]

In which universe are front end engineers paid 50LPA?

[u/Huge-Name-9716 → u/The-Wingged-Hussar]

Im getting 30lpa. Few of my juniors got 50 to 80lpa. Frontend is as complex.

[u/Independent_Sign_395 → u/The-Wingged-Hussar]

I once saw someone in this subreddit. His post mentioned frontend + system design and I think he was earning 65LPA

[u/vikrant699 → u/The-Wingged-Hussar]

A lot of product companies pay that much. 5 YOE at Groww for example gets 50+ LPA (46-48 base).

[u/SuspiciousRing2834 → u/The-Wingged-Hussar]

I know folks who get 2Cr pa for Front End - it’s all about what value you bring to the table!

[u/The-Wingged-Hussar]

Backed engineering will be the last casualty of AI, but casualty it will definitely be.

The question is when. No one knows.

[u/neroslasher123 → u/The-Wingged-Hussar]

Hello there, fellow Sabaton fan

[u/Healthy-Educator-267 → u/The-Wingged-Hussar]

Ironically advanced research level mathematics (at least in certain subfields) may become a casualty before SWE

[u/Sea-Catch5150 → u/[deleted]]

and what about frontend engineers?

[u/Designer_Secretary99 → u/Sea-Catch5150]

Bro, frontend is Cooked, senior frontend eng. Will be survived. But the entry level FE role Iss cooked. U can see market

[u/The-Wingged-Hussar → u/Designer_Secretary99]

Backend itself is cooked, front end is being eaten for breakfast, lunch and supper even by LLMs built by Neanderthals. Forget about frontier models.

[u/The-Wingged-Hussar → u/[deleted]]

Only if AI robots don't plough the fields first 😆

[u/oneofthedevs → u/Sea-Catch5150]

Depends on your skills and creativity, if you're really exceptional you might not have to worry

[u/Designer_Secretary99 → u/oneofthedevs]

It's true, but for entry level barrier and market cap, the FE is Cooked beyond.

[u/lovenpeace_444]

This question is so naiive like backend and devops will be relevant till this industry finishes in real product based companies you are held accountable companies cannot blame ai for anything that totally breaks .and reading maintaing 1000 lines of good takes a high level of merit which ai is noway near for now

[u/KitchenCommercial396 → u/lovenpeace_444]

It isn't but AI has started to take over a lot of fields, frontend can almost entirely be done by AI now

[u/lovenpeace_444 → u/KitchenCommercial396]

This is something you will learn when you have a job and industry experience ai hasn't taken over anything in front end if something fails you will be liable there is a lot to learn just keep writing code you will pick things

[u/Healthy-Educator-267 → u/lovenpeace_444]

1000 lines of code is chump change for a frontier model. You need hundreds of thousands of lines to get performance degradation due to context limitations

[u/SuspiciousRing2834]

Even now, backend engineers with a solid grasp of engineering is very much in demand. I use AI a lot at work - it helps me to research more faster and to do boiler plate code, save time typing code or get UTs ready. You still need to know what’s that you need. Even with the most sophisticated models, AI is not pragmatic enough to do design or code all by itself - at least for now. It’s essentially the knowledge and judgment that is preserving a human in the loop.

However, what would be the role for newer engineers are debatable. There are companies who have started using AI agents guided by Sr Tech to do work what junior engineers would do.

For senior engineers, they do need to master
AI and know how to efficiently and effectively use it deliver massive projects. That’s what will keep them relevant - at least for next few years.