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Perl did make a dramatic return to TIOBE’s top 10. It climbed from No. 27 in the September 2024 comparison to No. 10 in September 2025, with a 2.03% rating. But that is a rise in TIOBE’s popularity and visibility metric—not proof that Perl suddenly dominates new software projects, hiring, or production deployments.
What actually rose?
Three related figures explain the headline:
- Rank: Perl moved from No. 27 to No. 10 year over year in TIOBE’s September 2025 index.
- Rating: Perl recorded a 2.03% share in the September 2025 table.
- Visibility: The index measures public attention and ecosystem signals, not the number of running Perl applications.
For context, Perl was No. 13 with a 1.47% rating in TIOBE’s June 2025 table, compared with a prior-year rank of 27. The relevant snapshots are available on TIOBE’s June 2025 index page and the current TIOBE index entry point. The source material available for this article does not verify Perl’s exact August 2026 position.
So “Perl rose by 17 places” describes a ranking change, not a 17-place increase in users. Rank is comparative: another language can fall while Perl’s underlying activity remains broadly stable.
What does the TIOBE index measure?
TIOBE describes its Programming Community index as a monthly indicator of language popularity. Reported signals include engineers, courses, third-party vendors, and web activity involving services such as Google, Bing, Wikipedia, and Amazon. Its methodology is a useful guide to what the index is designed to capture: public visibility and attention around programming languages.
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That makes TIOBE a comparative visibility index. It is not a language-quality ranking, and it is not a direct census of:
- production deployments or executed code;
- developer salaries or job openings;
- GitHub activity;
- package downloads;
- enterprise revenue; or
- future growth.
Other measurements answer different questions. Stack Overflow surveys capture the preferences and reported usage of respondents. GitHub data reflects activity on one code-hosting platform. Package registries measure downloads, which may include automation, mirrors, or transitive dependencies. Job-board counts indicate hiring demand but depend heavily on geography and terminology. None is automatically “the correct” popularity measure.
Why did Perl move so sharply?
Books and search visibility
In an InfoWorld report, TIOBE CEO Paul Jansen said the number of Perl books listed on Amazon was an important technical factor in the calculation. He said Perl had four times as many listed books as PHP and seven times as many as Rust.
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That may help explain how TIOBE’s score moved. It does not prove that Perl gained four times as many users, or that companies launched a comparable number of new Perl systems. Documentation and book visibility can be especially influential for a mature language with a long history and a large installed codebase.
The Perl 5 and Perl 6 naming problem
Jansen also suggested that an older identity problem has become less disruptive. The language once known as Perl 6 is now called Raku, leaving “Perl” more clearly associated with Perl 5.
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That is a branding and discoverability explanation, not independently proven evidence of a market revival. Raku is a separate sister language with its own implementation and ecosystem; it is not simply the latest Perl 5 compiler. The distinction is reflected in the ecosystem overview at Perl.org.
Maintenance demand and community activity
Other explanations are plausible but should be treated as context rather than measured causes. Perl 5 remains actively developed, CPAN remains a substantial distribution ecosystem, and organizations still need to maintain long-lived infrastructure and enterprise software. Those activities can generate searches, documentation demand, support questions, and training material even when they do not represent a wave of greenfield development.
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Perl 5 versus Raku
For most practical discussions today:
- Perl 5 is the established production language generally meant by “Perl.”
- Perl 6 was a separate successor effort that was later renamed Raku.
- Raku has its own language identity, implementation, and ecosystem. It should not be treated as a Perl 5 version.
Separating the names may reduce confusion in search results and rankings, but it does not by itself demonstrate increased deployment of either language.
Is Perl still technically maintained?
Yes. Perl is community-maintained rather than controlled by a single commercial vendor. The retrieved Perl policy documentation identifies the Perl 5.42.x series, released in July 2025, as the stable series in that document. It states that the project officially supports the two most recent stable release series and defines security support through its published policy at perldoc.perl.org.
Because release information changes, teams should verify the current stable release before installing or standardizing on a version. Perl uses a 5.X.Y version scheme: even-numbered minor series are stable, while odd-numbered series are development releases. The published release schedule listed a possible Perl 5.44 release in 2026 but marked its date as uncertain.
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Why CPAN still matters
CPAN is one of Perl’s most important practical assets. The Perl project describes it as a central archive and distribution ecosystem with more than 25,000 Perl distributions, global mirrors, and automated testing infrastructure. A fuller explanation is available in the project’s CPAN white paper.
For maintainers, that means mature libraries for text processing, networking, databases, testing, web development, and systems work. Existing applications may be able to reuse well-understood modules instead of undergoing a costly rewrite.
CPAN is not risk-free. Module quality and maintenance status vary. Some dependencies require older Perl versions, native libraries, or platform-specific build steps. A large archive does not mean every distribution is modern or actively maintained. Teams should inventory dependencies, check release and security history, pin versions, test upgrades in staging, and use reproducible builds.
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Where Perl remains a rational choice
Perl can still be a sensible technology when the problem and organization fit its strengths:
- Legacy enterprise and government systems: A stable, tested Perl system may be cheaper and safer to maintain than to rewrite.
- Systems administration: Perl remains useful for automation, infrastructure utilities, and operational scripts.
- Text-heavy processing: Log analysis, reporting, parsing, and data transformation remain natural use cases for Perl’s mature text-processing capabilities.
- ETL and integration work: Existing CPAN modules can shorten work involving databases, files, networks, and structured data.
- Bioinformatics and scientific tooling: Perl has established libraries and institutional code in these fields.
- Mature internal web applications: Continuing with Perl may be rational when the framework, modules, tests, and team knowledge already exist.
These are cases for fit and economics, not claims that Perl is automatically the best language. For greenfield development, teams may reasonably prefer Python, JavaScript or TypeScript, Go, Rust, Java, C#, or another language based on hiring, libraries, deployment, performance, and organizational standards.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Should a new developer learn Perl?
Learn Perl when there is a specific reason to use it. It is a good choice for someone maintaining a Perl estate, targeting an employer that uses Perl, working in infrastructure or bioinformatics, or benefiting substantially from a required CPAN module.
It is a less compelling generic first language for someone seeking the broadest entry-level job market or a large supply of contemporary web-development roles. It may also be a poor organizational choice when a team has no Perl expertise, does not want to train or hire for it, and needs integrations better supported elsewhere.
The right question is not “Did Perl reach No. 10?” It is “Will Perl reduce risk and development time for this particular team and system?”
Best Value
A practical decision framework
- Assess the codebase. Measure its size, test coverage, documentation, dependency age, and available maintainers.
- Check CPAN dependencies. Confirm that critical modules support the target Perl version and operating system, and investigate their maintenance history.
- Evaluate people. Determine whether the organization can recruit Perl developers, train existing engineers, or obtain specialist support.
- Validate deployment. Confirm that the runtime and native dependencies work consistently across Linux, BSD, macOS, Windows, containers, or cloud images used by the project.
- Match the project type. Perl is particularly defensible for maintenance, automation, text processing, and systems work; it requires stronger justification for a new product with no Perl expertise.
- Plan operations. Pin dependencies, test upgrades, track core Perl and module support, and document the build process.
The real meaning of Perl’s “comeback”
The evidence supports three different conclusions:
- True: Perl’s visibility in TIOBE increased sharply, reaching No. 10 with a 2.03% rating in September 2025.
- Plausible: Clearer separation from Raku, ongoing maintenance, legacy demand, documentation, and community activity may all have contributed to the visibility increase.
- Unproven: The available figures do not establish a broad renaissance in new production software, hiring, or developer mindshare.
Perl’s rise is therefore real within the metric that recorded it. The ranking is encouraging for maintainers and the Perl community, but it should not be mistaken for evidence that Perl has replaced Python or returned to its historical dominance. Perl once reached as high as third place in TIOBE, according to the reported historical record; a top-10 position in 2025 is a notable resurgence in visibility, not a restoration of that earlier market position.
Practical verdict
Maintaining Perl: Usually continue when the system is stable, tested, documented, and its dependencies are manageable. A rewrite should have a business and technical case, not merely a desire to follow a newer trend.
Learning Perl: Sensible for a particular job, codebase, domain, or CPAN-driven project. Less compelling as a language chosen only for the widest general-purpose career market.
Starting a new project: Evaluate Perl against team expertise, hiring, library health, deployment, support, and long-term maintenance. TIOBE’s ranking can be one contextual signal, but it should not make the architectural decision for you. The official Perl documentation is the appropriate starting point for evaluating the language itself.
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