20 Questions to Ask In Your Developer Experience Surveys

If you’re building software, you’re building it with people. And people, especially developers, do their best work when they’re heard.

Understanding what your engineering team needs, what slows them down, and what motivates them isn’t guesswork. It’s a conversation. And the best way to have that conversation at scale is through developer experience surveys.

“You can’t improve what you don’t understand. Developer surveys help you cut through assumptions and actually hear what your team is experiencing every day.” says Alex Circei, CEO of Waydev.

At Waydev, we’ve seen how powerful the right questions can be, not only in surfacing issues early, but in showing engineers that their voice matters. Below, we’ve outlined 20 practical questions (grouped by focus area) to include in your next developer experience survey, plus tips to help you get meaningful insights and make better decisions.

What Should You Ask Developers About?

A great developer experience survey covers more than just satisfaction, it digs into alignment, collaboration, culture, customer empathy, and how work actually gets done. Here are five areas you can’t afford to skip:

20 Developer Survey Questions That Actually Reveal Something

Here’s a list of questions to include in your next survey, organized by focus area. These are the kinds of questions that lead to insight, not just checkbox answers.

Alignment with Business Goals

• “Do you feel motivated by our mission and objectives?”
  
• “Are your team’s priorities clearly communicated?”
  
• “Do you understand how your work contributes to company success?”
  
• “How often are you updated on changing business goals?”

Team Collaboration

• “Do you feel supported by your teammates when working on projects?”
  
• “How would you rate collaboration between engineering and other teams?”
  
• “Are you comfortable asking for help or sharing feedback?”
  
• “What makes collaboration harder than it needs to be?”

Company Culture & Psychological Safety

• “Do you feel comfortable speaking up or sharing concerns with your team or manager?”
  
• “Would you say our leadership team is open and inclusive in the way they work?”
  
• “Do you feel like your contributions are seen and valued?”
  
• “How clearly and consistently does leadership communicate important company updates?”

Understanding User Needs

• “How often do you get feedback from users about your work?”
  
• “Do you feel you have enough time to factor in user needs?”
  
• “What obstacles do you face when translating user feedback into code?”
  
• “Are the tools we use for collecting user insights effective?”

Workload and Task Management

• “How do you currently prioritize your tasks?”
  
• “Are deadlines usually realistic and achievable?”
  
• “Do you have the resources and tools you need to work efficiently?”
  
• “What changes could reduce daily workflow friction?”

“These kinds of questions open up honest conversations. You don’t need a 50-question form, just the right prompts to make developers feel heard.” explains Circei.

Best Practices for Developer Experience Surveys

Just throwing out a Google Form once a year doesn’t cut it. Here’s how to make your survey count:

• Keep it short and focus. Aim for completion in under 10 minutes. If the questions feel like homework, no one’s finishing it.
  
• Use clear, human language. Ditch jargon and formalities. Make the survey sound like it’s coming from someone on the team, not a legal department.
  
• Mix rating scales with open-ended prompts. Quantitative answers help with trend tracking, but written responses uncover nuance.
  
• Act on the result. Don’t survey unless you’re ready to follow through. Transparency about what you heard and what you’ll do builds trust.

Tools to Help: Waydev’s DX Module

Waydev’s Developer Experience (DX) module helps teams send micro-surveys directly through Slack, so feedback feels like part of the workflow, not a chore. It captures real-time insights into workload, blockers, collaboration, and sentiment.

“At Waydev, we built our DX module because we couldn’t find a fast, lightweight way to measure developer experience in real time. So we made one.” says Circei.

With data from the DX module, engineering leaders can spot friction early, support their teams better, and improve velocity without burnout.

Final Thoughts

Behind every successful product is a team of developers, and behind every great developer is a manager who listens.

By asking smart, relevant questions, you’ll uncover the insights that matter most: how your team feels, where they’re getting stuck, and what they need to thrive. And when developers thrive, so does your company.