But which language should you learn? You will find seemingly unlimited programming languages that are free to learn and develop projects with online. With the field of technology developing rapidly every year, the internet is a great place to be when you are trying to discover the latest developments or discover a new skill.

Whatever language you learn, you may find it helpful to take notes or make diagrams detailing the steps you are taking and why. It's important for programmers to be able to communicate their processes to non-technical stakeholders, but note-taking can also be a great learning tool. Eric Hart Zig, a software engineer at META, offers, “It turns out that this is often useful not only for creating documentation but often for solving a task or problem where the underlying technology is difficult to understand.

5 major types of programming languages

Although you'll find dozens of ways to classify different programming languages, they generally fall into five broad categories. Note that some languages may fall under more than one category:

1. Procedural programming languages

A procedural language follows a sequence of statements or commands in order to achieve a desired output. Each series of steps is called a procedure, and a program written in one of these languages will have one or more procedures within it. Common examples of procedural languages include:

C and C++
Java
Pascal
BASIC

Get Skills with the help of the above languages:

Computer Science, Computer Programming, C++, Object-Oriented Programming (OOP), Iteration, Variables, Conditionals, vectors, Files, Strings, Functions, Recursion, Objects, Polymorphism, Inheritance

2. Functional programming languages

Rather than focusing on the execution of statements, functional languages focus on the production of mathematical functions and evaluations. Each function–a reusable module of code–performs a specific task and returns a result. The result will depend on what data you enter into the function. Some popular functional programming languages include:

Scala
Erlang
Haskell
Elixir
F#

Get Skills with the help of the above languages:

Scala Programming, Parallel Computing, Apache Spark, Functional Programming, Recursion, Immutable Data Types, Higher Order Functions, Laziness, Type Class, Referential Transparency, Reactive Programming, Data Structures, Data Parallelism, Parallel Algorithms, SQL Data

3. Object-oriented programming languages (OOP)

This type of language treats a program as a group of objects containing data and program elements, known as attributes and methods. Objects can be reused within a program or in other programs. This makes it a popular language type for complex programs, as the code is easy to reuse and scale. Some common object-oriented languages include:

Java
Python
PHP
C++
Ruby

Get Skills with the help of the above languages:

Debugging, Algorithms, Hash Table, Software Design, Problem Solving, Data Analysis, Java Programming, Object-Oriented Programming (OOP), Software Engineering, Data Structure, Computer Programming, String (Computer Science), Cryptography, Logic Programming, Sorting Algorithm, Trees (Data Structures), Linked List, Binary Tree.

4. Scripting languages

Programmers use scripting languages to automate repetitive tasks, manage dynamic web content, or support processes in large applications. Some common scripting languages include:

PHP
Ruby
Python
bash
Perl
Node.js

Get Skills with the help of above languages:

Linux, Bash (Unix Shell), Extract Transform and Load (ETL), Linux Commands, Shell Script

5. Logic programming languages

Instead of telling a computer what to do, a logic programming language expresses a series of facts and rules to instruct the computer on how to make decisions. Some examples of logical languages include:

Prolog
Absys
Datalog
Alma-0

Other ways to classify programming languages

You will find many other ways of classifying languages in addition to the five listed above. Let's take a closer look at other ways you can think about programming languages:

Front-end vs. back-end languages

Front-end languages mainly deal with the 'user' side of software. The front end deals with all the text, colors, buttons, images, and navigation that a user will encounter while navigating your website or application. Anyone with a background in graphic design or art may be more motivated to start learning one of the front-end languages.

Some examples of front-end programming languages include:

HTML
CSS
JavaScript
React

Get Skills with the help of the above languages:

Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), HTML, UI/UX design, React, JavaScript, Web Development Tools, User Interface, Front-End Web Development, HTML and CSS, Responsive Web Design, Test-Driven Development, Object-Oriented Programming (OOP), Linux, Web Development, Bash (Unix Shell), Github, Version Control, Debugging, React (Web Framework), Web Application, Application development, Unit Testing, Web Design, User Experience (UX), Accessibility, Pseudocode, Algorithms, Communication, Data Structure, Computer Science

Backend languages deal with the storage and manipulation of the server side of the software. It is the part of the software that the user does not come in direct contact with but supports their experience behind the scenes. It includes data architecture, scripting, and communication between applications and the underlying database.

Anyone with a background in math or engineering may be more interested in back-end development.

Some examples of back-end programming languages include:

JavaScript
PHP
Java
Python
Ruby
C#

Get Skills with the help of the above languages:

Cloud Hosting, Application Programming Interfaces (API), Python Programming, Computer Programming, Django (Web Framework), Linux, Web Development, Bash (Unix Shell), Github, Version Control, MySQL, Database (DBMS), database administration, Build a data model, Design a web application, Debugging, Authentication and authorization, REST APIs, Filtering and ordering, Serializers and deserializes, Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), HTML, Production environments, JavaScript, API endpoints, Pseudocode, Algorithms, Communication, Data Structure, Computer Science

A full-stack developer combines their knowledge of both front- and back-end languages, along with other technical skills and expertise, to work on any part of the development process.

Get Skills with the help of the above languages:

Cloud Native, HTML, DevOps, open source, Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), Git (Software), Iaas PaaS Saas, Distributed Version Control (DRCS), Hybrid Multicloud, JavaScript, Cloud Computing, Cloud Applications, Web Development, Cloning and forking, Github, Distributed Version Control Systems (DVCS), User Interface, React (Web Framework), Front-end Development, back-end development, Server-side JavaScript, express, Computer Science, Data Science, Python Programming, Data Analysis, Pandas, Numpy, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Web Application, Application Development, Flask, Relational Database (RDBMS), Object Relational Mapping (ORM), SQL, Django (Web Framework), Back-End Applications, Kubernetes, Docker, Containers, Openshift, serverless, Microservices, Representational State Transfer (REST), Full Stack Development, Node.Js

High-level vs. low-level languages

The major factor that differentiates high- and low-level programming languages is whether the language is intended to be easily understood by a human programmer or a computer.

Low-level languages are machine-friendly, making them highly efficient in terms of memory usage but difficult to understand without the help of an assembler. Since they are not very people-friendly because they do not use human language, they are also not widely used for coding. Examples of these machine languages include machine code, binary code, and assembly languages.

On the other hand,

high-level languages are less memory intensive but much more human-friendly. This programming style makes it easy to write, understand, maintain and debug. The most popular programming languages in use today are considered high-level languages.

Interpreted vs. Compiled Languages.

The change between interpreted and compiled languages is how they convert high-level code and make it readable by computers. With interpreted languages, code is passed through a program called an interpreter, which reads and executes the code line by line. This tends to make these languages more flexible and platform independent.

Examples of interpreted languages include:

Python
JavaScript
PHP
Ruby

Compiled languages Go through the build phase where the entire program is converted to machine code. This makes execution faster, but it also means that you have to recompile or "build" the program every time you need to make a change.

Examples of compiled languages include:

C, C++, and C#
Rust
Erlang

Markup language

Often, markup languages such as Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) are classified as programming languages. Technically, markup languages are not considered to be the same as programming languages. Instead, they are text-encoding systems made up of symbols that control the formatting and structure of content on a page or document.

Learn to code on Coursera

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