Easier, way easier.
I'm learning Chinese but I can barely communicate. If I spent this time on a programming language I'd have learnt 5 of them by now.
this post was submitted on 18 Feb 2026
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Learning any spoken language is way harder.
Learning the language -- easier. Writing good software -- harder.
It depends on what level of competency you're expecting. If we count "able to use professionally" I'd say learning a human language take longer/is harder?
As an immigrant who had to learn English (and a very small amount of French) and also programming languages, programming languages are much, much easier. You don't have to deal with tenses or conjugation, you don't have to learn pronounciation rules because most things you express in programming is not directly pronouncable, there isn't a million weird syntax and spelling exceptions that you just have to memorize, and you don't have this disparity between formal and casual language. Learning technical or literary writing is even more complex.
Computer science as a whole is in my opinion more like learning a language. Once you know the fundamental concepts of computation, different programming languages are more like dialects than full languages.
Expanding on everything you mentioned...
Programming languages must be structured (otherwise, compilers and interpreters couldn't parse them).
Natural languages try to have structure, but introduce so many exceptions, that it creates a higher cognitive load to remember (but it makes speeches/written works more interesting).
definitely easier, but i helps if you know the language that the programming language is targetted to.
python, for example, was created in the netherlands, but it's definately written for english speakers.
Does anybody have examples of popular programming languages that are not targeted to English?
Not comparable, the "language" part of programming language is more an analogy for human-machine programming interface. It's an abstraction for logicical instructions and not comparable to human-to-human communication IMHO
With human languages, we are trying to communicate with each other. Programming languages don't do that.
Much easier because you need to learn a lot less vocab and grammar.
but harder because u have to give a very very detailed instructions instead of just saying what you want.
sudo make me a sandwich
Success, you are a sandwich now!
What a terribly designed project if even compilation requires sudo.
I think the first one may be comparable, but for subsequent languages I think programming is much easier.
Granted, I only know one language that works with people, and have worked in dozens of programming languages over the years.
Iβd say youβre trying to compare apples and oranges. Theyβre both called languages but their differences dwarf their similarities.
Once you learn one programming language, learning other ones is easier, because now you know how to program, which in many ways is the hard part, and distinct from the languages themselves.
I feel like assuming you already know at least one programming language it's a lot easier to pick up another one then it is to learn another language. But for the first one, I agree with others that it's like comparing appels to oranges.
Learning to code is way different than learning a language
Much easier. Learning a programming language is just a small part of learning to code and it doesn't take much effort at all.
I personally found it easier but this is anecdotal