The one number you need to increase ROI per engineer

Engineering leaders have struggled to quantify the business impact of developer experience and productivity. While other business functions can demonstrate their impact, software engineering leaders have lacked clear measures for discussing their organization’s productivity and the work being done to improve it.

Quantifying the impact of developer experience

The Developer Experience Index (DXI) is the first validated engineering effectiveness measure directly linked to business outcomes.

Built on data from over 40,000 developers across 800 organizations, this predictive benchmark evaluates key dimensions of the developer experience, from deep work to code maintainability. Research reveals that top-quartile DXI scores correlate with significantly higher engineering speed and quality, alongside substantial improvements in employee engagement.

A direct link to business impact

What makes the DXI transformative is its proven link to business outcomes. DXI improvements translate to measurable time savings for developers, creating a clear pathway to calculate ROI and understand the potential impact of improvements.

Unlike conventional metrics like lead time or mean time to recover, which can’t be quantified financially, the DXI bridges the gap between developer experience and business impact.

Implementation as part of a proven metrics strategy

Organizations using the DXI integrate it within the broader DX Core 4 framework to comprehensively understand engineering productivity. This report explains how to start with the DXI and details key results.