‘If software development were an F1 race, these inefficiencies are the pit stops that eat into lap time’: Why developers need to sharpen their focus on documentation

Software developers face an array of productivity-related hurdles in their daily workflows. From tool sprawl to cumbersome workloads and, more recently, AI integration challenges.

However, another area that’s also proving troublesome is documentation, according to Stack Overflow.

Research from the company shows missing, fragmented, or inconsistent documentation was identified by developers as one of their biggest productivity barriers in 2025.

But as Stack Overflow found, they're not exactly helping themselves on this front, with many shirking responsibilities.

Indeed, fewer than one-third (30%) of developers revealed they document code on a daily basis. Meanwhile, nearly half (40%) fail to do so each week, and none reported documenting on a monthly basis.

Why documentation matters in software development

Well-maintained documentation is a key component of the software development lifecycle (SDLC), according to Maurice Kalinowski, product director at Qt Group.

This allows developers to explain notable features of a particular project, detail progress, or provide information on a specific code base.

Imagine joining a project late and being given no information on progress or where the rest of your team is at? That’s the challenge devs face without proper documentation.

“One of the bigger benefits of architectural documentation is how it functions as an onboarding resource for developers,” Kalinowski told ITPro.

“It’s much easier for new joiners to grasp the system’s architecture and design principles, which means the burden’s not entirely on senior team members’ shoulders to do the training," he added.

“It also acts as a repository of institutional knowledge that preserves decision rationale, which might otherwise get lost when team members move to other projects or leave the company."

The cost of poor documentation

According to Stack Overflow, failures on this front create glaring knowledge gaps that not only frustrate developers, but end up slowing down teams and hampering long-term development processes.

Stack Overflow’s study isn’t the only piece of research to highlight the productivity-related implications of poor documentation.

Atlassian’s 2025 State of DevEx report, for example, found half of developers lose around 10 hours a week just sourcing basic information they need to do their jobs.

Sven Peters, AI evangelist at Atlassian, told ITPro this highlights the need for a concerted focus on improving documentation: developers are wasting time that could otherwise be spent on critical tasks.

“Every day, developers lose time because of inefficiencies in their organization – they get bogged down in repetitive tasks and waste time navigating between different tools,” he said.

“They also end up losing time trying to locate pertinent information – like that one piece of documentation that explains an architectural decision from a previous team member,” Peters added.

“If software development were an F1 race, these inefficiencies are the pit stops that eat into lap time. Every unnecessary context switch or repetitive task equals more time lost when trying to reach the finish line.”

Can AI help the situation?

With an influx of AI tools in software development, Stack Overflow questioned whether the use of the technology could help improve matters on this front.

However, developers show little appetite for capitalizing on AI. More than one-third (39%) of respondents said they have no plans to use AI for documenting code.

Similarly, 40% said they don’t plan on using AI for “creating or maintaining other documentation”.

“Documentation and deployments appear to either be not routine enough to warrant AI assistance or otherwise removed from existing workflows so that not much time is spent on it,” the company said.

Entry-level devs are bearing the brunt

For developers of all experience levels, Stack Overflow highlighted a concerning divide in terms of documentation activities.

Senior developers, for example, spend the least time documenting in their daily workflows while mid-career devs spend more time and experience the most frustration.

This has a trickle down effect on developer teams, the study warned, harming broader knowledge exchange and impacting early-career developers.

Essentially, those with less experience end up suffering from a lack of clear documentation, which impairs their understanding of particular projects or code bases.

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