A collection of recommended newletters for software engineers and engineering leaders
Published on November 12, 2022.
After deleting Twitter some time ago, I found that there was something of a hole in my media consumption and a lack of a centralised place to keep up with software engineering trends, news, advice, and have informative articles recommended to me regularly. Twitter can obviously be great for this if used intentionally, but I found that the inevitable downsides of using a platform like Twitter — with a business model based on engagement, time on platform, and hot takes — led me to lose far more in wasted time than I was actually gaining from using it. Email newsletters, and in particular, Substack have been an incredible replacement for much (though not all) of the software engineering content I was previously discovering via Twitter.
I read a mix of different content creators on Substack and elsewhere — some slightly more hot take immediate news-type content than others, but mostly these newsletters are full of high quality, well written, well researched, long form content of the kind that will actually grow your knowledge and your career along many different dimensions.
In no particular order, these are the newsletters I am currently subscribed to and gain a lot of value from.
The Pragmatic Engineer
If I could only pick one newsletter to subscribe to it would be The Pragmatic Engineer. Written by Gergely Orosz who was an engineering manager and senior engineer at Uber, Skype, and Skyscanner, it's the best place to go to for deep dives and in-depth news on the industry for engineering managers and senior engineers.
https://newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/
Quastor
A great read for growing as a software engineer. Quastor curates the best of technical blogs, has extremely informative deep dives on software engineering and architecture topics, and keeps your problem solving skills sharp with regular interview type questions on algorithms and data structures.
Big Technology
Original, independent journalism focused on Big Tech companies - Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, and Microsoft (sorry Netflix, the FAANG acronym makes little sense in 2022).
https://bigtechnology.substack.com/
Kent C Dodds
Kent is an amazing educator on frontend technologies, with a specialization in React. His articles are always high quality, well-written, and mostly offer very actionable advice for the kinds of codebases most developers are working in. https://kentcdodds.com/
Software Lead Weekly
A curated newsletter of the best content from around the web, focusing on people, culture and leadership in tech. https://softwareleadweekly.com/
Pointer
Pointer self-describes as "...a reading club for developers. It's a window into what current and future CTOs are reading and thinking about. Super high quality engineering-related content, not just trendy topics or link bait." Overall it consistently meets this goal with especially good content on engineering leadership.
The M&Ms
A newsletter for engineering leaders, written by Louie Bacaj. His short course Timeless Advice for Software Engineers is worth checking out - he imparts a lot of wisdom on how to manage a career in engineering long-term.
https://newsletter.memesmotivations.com/
Bytes
An excellent and entertaining newsletter to keep up on the ever-changing JavaScript eco-system.
ByteByteGo
A weekly drip feeding of refreshers and updates on topics and trends in large-scale system design from the authors of the System Design Interview books.
Lethian
Excellent articles written by Will Larson - the author of two amazing books for engineering leaders - Staff Engineer and An Elegant Puzzle
Morning Brew
A non-engineering recommendation, Morning Brew is a great way to get a curated and informative take on the days news, with a focus on business, investment, politics, and tech.
https://www.morningbrew.com/daily
Emerging Tech Brew
See above, but with a focus on emerging technologies like automation, AI, and green energy.
https://www.emergingtechbrew.com/
Study Hacks
I'm a huge fan of Cal Newport's work, recommending his book Deep Work to just about everyone I meet, and his newsletter has many great tidbits on the subject of deep work and living a deep, focused, and more rewarding life.