"Excited, anxious, invigorated." That's how one engineering leader described going AI-native. We asked 218 others how they feel. The results? Remarkably consistent: "Insecurity, mistrust, hope." "Optimistic, excited, threatened." It's the same people, holding many feelings at once. That's the baseline running through our new report, The State of AI-Native Engineering in 2026, co-authored with @VinayPerneti and @EmmaStarks.

The engineering leaders we spoke to ranged from managers to CTOs, overseeing teams of 1 to 1,000+ engineers. The sample skews AI-forward. Here’s what they told us. → 48% of their code is now AI-generated. → 55% are concerned or very concerned about losing shared understanding of the codebase. → 63% say their engineers are raising fears about skill relevance to their managers. → At the largest teams (201-1,000 engineers), that last number rises to 89%.