React and JavaScript Are Showing Up in Fewer Job Postings. Here's What's Rising Instead
Two of the most famous skills in tech are showing up in fewer job postings than they were three months ago.
We track how often each skill appears across the same 2,306 companies, week after week. Over the 90 days ending August 31, 2026:
- React — named in 14.5% fewer postings
- JavaScript — named in 9.9% fewer postings
Not gone. Not obsolete. Just asked for less often than three months ago. (Both still show up at hundreds of companies — React at 715, JavaScript at 814.)
So what got named more? Mostly, not more code.
Over the same three months, these are the skills companies started naming more often:
- Curiosity — up 10.9%
- Adaptability — up 8.7%
- Reliability — up 7.4%
- Initiative — up 6.9%
- Communication, written and verbal — up 4–6%
And yes, artificial intelligence is climbing too — AI now appears in nearly one of every four postings we scan, up 7.8%. Debugging is up 11%.
Read that list again. Curiosity. Adaptability. Reliability. Initiative. These aren't things you pick up from a certificate. They're the human traits that decide whether someone stays useful once the tools change — which, right now, they're changing every few months.
A caveat worth stating plainly: these numbers measure how often a skill is named in postings, over one 90-day window. A dip doesn't mean React is finished — it means, right now, fewer employers are putting it front and center. Snapshots move.
But the direction is hard to ignore. As AI takes over the routine parts of technical work, companies seem to care less about which framework you memorized and more about whether you can think, adapt, and be trusted to run with something.
If you're betting on what to learn next, don't just stack another framework on the pile. Many of the skills rising right now are the human traits no tool can replace.
P.S. Curious which skills your target role is actually asking for this week? Every role we track has a live page — see Software Engineer or AI Engineer for the full, current list.