The 2023 State of Open Source Report confirms security as top issue

For the second year in a row, the Open Source Initiative and OpenLogic by Perforce collaborated to launch a global survey about the use of Open Source software in organizations. We drew hundreds of responses from all over the world, and once again, the results are illustrative of the Open Source space as a whole, including use, adoption, challenges, and the level of investment and maturity in Open Source software. 

The 2023 State of Open Source Report presents key usage, adoption, and trend data that paints a complete picture of Open Source software in organizations today. The report also includes a breakdown of the most important technologies by category, and across demographics and firmographics. 

The world of technology is constantly changing, and it can be hard to stay up to date on the latest software. The report features more than 160 of the most popular Open Source technologies and tools, as well as insights into how organizations are investing in Open Source and the most desirable technologies.  

We encourage you to read sections of interest or the whole report, which covers every major category including Linux distributions, infrastructure software, cloud-native, programming languages and runtimes, frameworks, data technologies, SDLC and build tools, automation and configuration tooling, and of course, CI/CD. 

Some of the key findings: 

• Open Source continues to grow in prominence; 4 in 5 survey respondents, a whopping 80%, indicated that they increased the use of Open Source software in their organizations in the past year, with 41% reporting a “significant” increase.  
• Open Source technologies play an integral role in all types of operations. Respondents listed Linux, Apache HTTP, Git, Node.js, WordPress, Tomcat, Jenkins, PHP, and NGINX as the most business-critical software for their organizations.  
• Container technology and software development lifecycle (SDLC) tools ranked as the most used technologies. Container and container orchestration jumped from 18% to 33% of respondents’ usage, and they also received the highest amount of investment by organizations. 
• Cost reduction is no longer a key reason for Open Source adoption. In the 2022 report, the lack of license cost and overall cost reduction was the second most common reason for using Open Source, but this year it has dropped to ninth place.  
• The top Open Source adoption driver remains access to innovations and the latest technologies, illustrating how users value being on the cutting edge and see this as a competitive advantage. Organizations also choose Open Source due to the ability to contribute to, and influence the direction of, projects.  
• Security is top of mind. Maintaining security policies or compliance is the top support challenge for organizations using Open Source. Over 46% of organizations are performing security scans to identify vulnerabilities. 
• Technical support is needed for installations, upgrades, and configuration issues. Notably, personnel experience and proficiency again this year is highly ranked as a support concern across organizations of all sizes.  
• End-of-life (EOL) Open Source software remains in organizations for a long time. Nearly 12 months after AngularJS became EOL, 15% of organizations are still using it, the exact same percentage we saw in the 2022 report. In larger organizations, it’s up to 20%. As expected with EOL CentOS Linux, there was a decline in usage; it’s now at only 15.14%, while CentOS Stream and Rocky Linux became more widely adopted.  
• 36.79% of organizations contribute to Open Source, which includes contributions to projects or to organizations (code or other activities). This is a 5% increase from last year, so it’s trending in the right direction and is a good sign for many communities. 
• Over 25% of respondents in most industries are generating software bill of materials (SBOMs). Retail, government, banking, insurance, and financial services lead this category with the highest implementation of SBOM generation. 
• OSI’s membership has grown over the last year; 17% of respondents already sponsor OSI. We are encouraged by growing community participation and excited for all upcoming OSI initiatives and events in 2023. 

The 2023 State of Open Source Report clearly demonstrates how many organizations are moving from being merely consumers to engaging with Open Source communities and gaining expertise in full technology stacks. In some cases, they are even becoming leaders — driving and influencing the direction of new projects. Be sure to download the report and stay tuned for more content, analysis, and webinars in the coming weeks and months from OSI and OpenLogic by Perforce!