One of the best ways for software engineers to keep up to date with trends in the field is to attend conferences. And after a couple of years of virtual conferences and even canceled events, many organizations will be back in 2022 to holding in-person gatherings, and others are opting for hybrid events.
Attending these conferences will allow you to hear keynotes from world-class practitioners and learn from tech talks with leading authorities. You'll also have the opportunity to participate in informative Q&A sessions, as well as engage with peers who can help answer your questions. In addition, you'll acquire actionable ideas that you can bring back to your team and implement immediately.
Here is TechBeacon's shortlist of the most popular software engineering conferences in 2022.
January
ICSSE 2022
Twitter: N/AWeb: icsse.orgDate: January 21–23Location: Paris, France (also online)Cost: $170 to $500, depending on whether you're a student, presenter, or other type of attendee; whether you register before September 25; and whether you're attending online or in person
The fifth annual International Conference on Software and Services Engineering brings together top researchers from Asian-Pacific nations, North America, Europe, and elsewhere to exchange research results and address issues in computer science, software engineering, and service science.
Who should attend: Developers, software architects, researchers, practitioners, and educators
Data Council US – Austin 2022
Twitter: @DataCouncilAIWeb: datacouncil.ai/austinDate: January 27–28Location: Austin, Texas, USACost: $599 to $1,499
Data Council is a worldwide, community-driven technical conference that bridges the gap between data science, engineering, and analytics. This year there are six unique tracks, including data engineering, data science and analytics, machine-learning infrastructure, AI products, and a series of peer-led workshops.
Who should attend: Software engineers, machine-learning experts, deep-learning researchers, and artificial intelligence buffs
PyCon
Twitter: @PyCon, #pyconWeb: pycon.orgDate: January–DecemberLocation: Multiple (many are hybrid)Cost: Varies by location and whether you'll be online or in person; US national conference registration costs between $100 and $1,200
The international community for the Python programming language holds more than 50 conferences annually. Many of the conferences change venues every year and rely on volunteers to make them happen.
Who should attend: Developers, business leads, experienced programmers, hobby hackers, beginners, and other members of the Python community
February
DeveloperWeek
Twitter: twitter.com/developerweek, #DevWeek2022Web: developerweek.comDate: February 2–9Location: Virtual, and in person in Oakland, California, USACost: Until December 16: Pro Pass, $355; Premium Pass, $595
Each year, more than 8,000 developers, engineers, software architects, dev teams, managers, and executives from more than 70 countries gather for DeveloperWeek to discover the latest in developer technologies, languages, platforms, and tools.
Who should attend: Developers, software architects, data analysts, system administrators, and DevOps engineers
FOSDEM
Twitter: @FOSDEM, #FOSDEMWeb: fosdem.org/2022Date: February 5–6Location: OnlineCost: Free
FOSDEM is a two-day event that offers developers who work with open-source and free software a place to meet, share ideas, and collaborate. Renowned for being highly developer-oriented, the event brings together more than 8,000 geeks from all over the world.
Who should attend: Developers, testers, and DevOps engineers
ConFoo.CA
Twitter: @confooca, #ConFooWeb: confoo.ca/en/2022Date: February 23–25Location: Virtual, and in person in Montreal, Quebec, CanadaCost: Three-day in-person conference ticket, $995; three-day virtual conference ticket, $745 (early-bird discounts available); workshops, $700 and $1,100
ConFoo is a multi-technology conference for developers in Canada with international speakers; it focuses on pragmatic solutions for web developers. The conference typically features more than 150 presentations.
Who should attend: Developers and data scientists
March
SREcon22 Americas
Twitter: @SREcon, #SREconWeb: usenix.org/conference/srecon22americasDate: March 14–16Location: San Francisco, California, USACost: TBD
SREcon22 Americas is a gathering of engineers who care deeply about site reliability, systems engineering, and working with complex distributed systems at scale. SREcon strives to challenge those new to the profession as well as those who have been involved in it for decades. The conference has a culture of critical thought, deep technical insights, continuous improvement, and innovation.
Who should attend: QA testers, security teams, database administrators, network administrators, compliance experts, UX designers, government employees, and scientists
April
QCon London
Twitter: @qconlondon, #QConLondonWeb: qconlondon.comDate: April 4–6Location: London, UKCost: £1,715 plus VAT, but more after December 6
QCon London is a conference for senior software engineers, architects, and team leads. Deep-dive with software leaders on the patterns, practices, and use cases leveraged by innovative software professionals.
Who should attend: Senior software engineers, architects, and team leads
Devnexus
Twitter: @devnexus, #devnexusWeb: devnexus.comDate: April 11–13Location: Atlanta, Georgia, USACost: TBD
Conference organizers claim Devnexus is the largest Java platform conference in the United States. The conference is geared to professional software developers who want to hear from and interact directly with internationally acclaimed presenters and technologists. Devnexus also aims to connect developers from all over the world and promote open-source values. The conference focuses on Java, JVM (Java Virtual Machine) languages, cloud, and big data.
Who should attend: Java developers, cloud administrators, security practitioners, network architects, software architects, JavaScript developers, mobile and web developers, and application performance testers
Devoxx
Twitter: @Devoxx, #devoxxWeb: devoxx.fr/en/Date: April 20–22Location: Paris, FranceCost: Varies; from €290 for one day to €960 for all three days
Devoxx France is part of a family of conferences held globally each year. The conferences primarily focus on Java but cover a few other topics as well. The Paris conference attracts some 3,000 participants and more than 300 exhibitors and 240 speakers, with hands-on labs and workshops.
Who should attend: Developers, software architects, data analysts, system administrators, and DevOps engineers
DeveloperWeek Europe
Twitter: @DeveloperWeek, #DeveloperWeekEuropeWeb: developerweek.com/europe/Date: April 27–28Location: VirtualCost: TBD
DeveloperWeek Europe 2022 is a virtual software developer conference and expo dedicated to Europe's tech community. The event showcases more than 100 technical speakers from Europe, top technology companies, and corporate engineering teams. Some 2,000 engineering professionals and technical practitioners and leaders from across Europe will virtually gather for two days of education and networking
Who should attend: Developers, software architects, data analysts, system administrators, and DevOps engineers
May
QCon Plus Online
Twitter: @QCon, #QConPlus Web: plus.qconferences.comDate: May 10–20Location: VirtualCost: $799 (for the two-week conference); early bird pricing available
QCon Plus brings together senior software engineers across multiple domains to share their real-world implementations of emerging trends and practices. Attendees will find practical inspiration (not product pitches) from software leaders deep in the trenches creating software, scaling architectures, and fine-tuning their technical leadership to help them make the right decisions.
Who should attend: Senior software engineers, architects, and team leads
RailsConf 2022
Twitter: @railsconf, #RailsConfWeb: railsconf.comDate: May 17–19Location: Portland, Oregon, USACost: TBD
RailsConf is the world’s longest-running gathering of Ruby on Rails enthusiasts, practitioners, and companies. With a specific focus on Rails, conference topics can range from new users to administration to advanced techniques.
Who should attend: Ruby developers
GlueCon
Twitter: @gluecon, @defrag, #glueconWeb: gluecon.comDate: May 18–19Location: Broomfield, Colorado, USACost: $995
GlueCon is a developer-oriented conference focused on providing the latest in-depth technical information, presented in a format that fosters community. Topics change from year to year and have included APIs, DevOps, serverless, edge computing, containers, microservices, blockchain-driven applications, and the newest tools and platforms driving technology.
Who should attend: Software architects, developers, mobile developers and architects, DevOps engineers, enterprise and startup executives, and team managers
ICSE 2022
Twitter: @ICSEconf, #ICSE2022Web: conf.researchr.org/home/icse-2022Date: May 21–29Location: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USACost (2021): Free
ICSE, the IEEE/ACM International Conference on Software Engineering, provides a forum where researchers, practitioners, and educators gather to present and discuss the most recent innovations, trends, experiences, and issues in the field of software engineering.
Who should attend: Software engineering researchers, practitioners, and educators
Microsoft Build
Twitter: #MSBuildWeb: microsoft.com/en-us/buildDate (2021): May 25–27Location: VirtualCost (2021): Free
Build is a massive conference for developers who are building apps for Windows, Office 365, Edge/Internet Explorer, SQL Server, Azure, Xbox, and HoloLens. Build is now also relevant for Android, iOS, and open-source developers, thanks to Microsoft's push to distance itself from its old Windows-only strategy. Microsoft uses the conference to make important announcements for its ecosystem.
Who should attend: Windows developers, SQL Server DBAs, Azure admins, and general developers, IT administrators, and managers
DockerCon 2022
Twitter: @DockerCon, #DockerConWeb: docker.com/dockerconDate: May 28Location: VirtualCost: Free
This is multi-track conference, sponsored by Docker, focuses on the Docker platform and ecosystem. DockerCon Live is a container-industry conference for makers and operators of next-generation, distributed applications built with containers.
Who should attend: Developers, DevOps engineers, CxOs, and managers
June
React conferences
Twitter: VariesWeb: reactjs.org/community/conferences, renderatl.com, reactsummit.comDates: January 27–30 (Austria), June 1–4 (Atlanta), June 17 (Amsterdam), June 21 (online)Locations: Dornbirn, Austria (AgentConf); Atlanta, Georgia, USA (Render); Amsterdam, Netherlands (React Summit); online (React Summit);Cost: Varies
These conferences are staged by the community supporting React, a JavaScript library for building user interfaces. React conferences and locations vary from year to year.
Who should attend: JavaScript developers
Open Source Summit North America
Twitter: @linuxfoundation, #ossummitWeb: events.linuxfoundation.org/open-source-summit-north-america/Dates: June 21–24Locations: Austin, Texas, USA; virtualCost: TBD
Open Source Summits are a series of conferences sponsored by the Linux Foundation. In addition to the Austin forum, the Foundation will hold Open Source Summits in Dublin, Ireland, and Tokyo, Japan.
The vendor-neutral conference in North America allows open-source developers and technologists to collaborate, share information, and learn about the latest technologies and innovations across open source.
Who should attend: Software developers, programmers, open-source maintainers, Linux IT professionals, IT operations professionals, legal counsel, executives, managers, and students
September
Strange Loop
Twitter: @strangeloop_stlWeb: thestrangeloop.comDate: September 22–24Location: St. Louis, Missouri, USACost (2021): Conference, $600 to $800
Talks at Strange Loop, created in 2009 by a team of St. Louis-based friends and developers, are code-heavy and avoid process-oriented topics such as agile and testing. The organizers keep marketing to a minimum. Keynotes aren't sold to sponsors, and mailing lists of attendees are never sold or given to sponsors.Who should attend: Developers, entrepreneurs, system engineers, security professionals, and scientists
October
DotNETOS Conference
Twitter: @dotnetosorg, #dotNetconfWeb: conf.dotnetos.orgDate (2021): October 4–6Location (2021): VirtualCost (2021): Free
This three-day conference is dedicated solely to .NET performance, focusing on .NET 5, .NET Core, and .NET performance. Attendees will hear from top speakers from around the globe, including from companies such as Microsoft and JetBrains. All talks are in English.
Who should attend: Members of the .NET community
DjangoCon US
Twitter: @djangocon, #djangoconWeb: 2021.djangocon.usDate (2021): October 22–23Location (2021): VirtualCost (2021): Free
This is conference for users of the Django web framework caters to the entire spectrum of Django users, from those who develop business apps on the framework to those who tinker with it in their spare time. Conference planners are committed to diversity.
Who should attend: Web developers and hobbyists
November
Microsoft Ignite
Twitter: @MS_Ignite, #MSIgniteWeb: microsoft.com/en-us/igniteDate (2021): Nov 2–4Location (2021): VirtualCost (2021): Free with registration
Microsoft Ignite is for IT pros to explore the latest tools, receive deep technical training, and get questions answered by Microsoft experts. Ignite covers architecture, deployment, implementation and migration, development, operations and management, security, access management, compliance, usage, and adoption.
Who should attend: Microsoft developers, decision makers, implementers, architects, developers, and data professionals
.NET Conf
Twitter: @dnetcnf, #dotnetconfWeb: dotnetconf.netDate (2021): November 9–11Location: VirtualCost (2021): Free
This virtual conference for developers is organized by the .NET community and Microsoft. During the three-day event, developers participate in live streaming sessions where they can learn and ask questions in real time.
Who should attend: .NET developers
RubyConf
Twitter: @rubyconfWeb: rubyconf.orgDate (2021): November 8–10Location (2021): Denver, Colorado, USA; virtualCost (2021): $200 to $1,000
RubyConf is organized by Ruby Central, a nonprofit organization dedicated to the support and advocacy of the Ruby programming language. Its RubyConf event is designed to allow the full spectrum of Ruby users, from novices to experts, discuss emerging ideas, collaborate, and socialize.
Who should attend: Ruby developers and hobbyists
December
GopherCon
Twitter: @GopherCon, #gopherconWeb: gophercon.comDate (2021): December 6–10Location: VirtualCost (2021): Conference, December 8–10: free; half-day workshops, held on December 6 and December 7, for $295 each, and a "full-day" workshop that spans both days for $495
GopherCon is an annual conference for the Go programming language community. Originally organized in 2014 by the Gopher Academy, a community-driven group of developers who want to promote the use of Go, the event has steadily grown in size, to over 1,500 attendees. The conference is preceded by two days of workshops.
Who should attend: Go developers and users
DevTernity
Twitter: @devternityWeb: devternity.comDate (2021): December 10–11Location (2021): VirtualCost (2021): €399 to €798
Rather than focus on a particular framework, technology, or language, DevTernity addresses the fundamental building blocks and practices necessary for building better, modern software systems. The forum covers the latest developments in coding, architecture, operations, security, leadership, and many other IT topics.
Who should attend: Developers, architects, operations professionals, and DevOps engineers
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Make your choices soon and mark your calendars, since prices can vary based on how early you register. Also, remember that hotel and travel costs are almost always separate from the conference pricing.
Not all dates, locations, and pricing were available at publication time, especially for those events taking place later in the year. In those cases, we have provided historical information about the event to give you an idea of what to expect, and what you'll get out of attending.
