Developer Relations guide

Developer Relations (DevRel): a career guide for tech communicators

DevRel is the bridge between a tech company and its developer community. Here is what DevRel professionals do, who thrives in it, and how to break in.

What is Developer Relations?

Developer Relations (DevRel) professionals help developers understand, adopt, and succeed with a company's technology — usually APIs, SDKs, or developer tools.

They are part marketing, part education, part community, and part product feedback. DevRel professionals sit at the intersection of technical depth and human communication — a rare and valuable combination.

DevRel roles

DevRel is not a single job. These are the four most common roles, each with a different focus.

Developer Advocate

Most common role

Speaks at conferences, creates tutorials, writes technical content, and represents developers internally. The public face of a developer platform.

Developer Experience (DX) Engineer

Product-side DevRel

Focuses on the developer journey — documentation, onboarding, sample apps, SDKs. Makes the product easier to understand and adopt.

Community Manager

Relationship-focused

Builds and maintains developer communities across Discord, forums, and Slack. Keeps communities active, welcoming, and useful.

Technical Writer

Documentation specialist

Creates developer documentation, API references, and guides. The best technical writers make complex systems feel obvious.

What DevRel actually does: a week in the life

No two weeks are the same in DevRel. Here is a realistic example of how the work flows.

MondayWrite a technical tutorial for a new API feature

TuesdayReview developer documentation pull requests

WednesdayRecord a demo video, respond to community questions on Discord

ThursdayGive a webinar to 200 developers about a new product

FridayCompile developer feedback for the product team — the voice of the developer

Who thrives in DevRel

DevRel rewards a specific combination of skills that is rare in any single discipline.

Technical enough to understand the product and speak credibly to developers
Strong communicator — can explain complex concepts clearly
Genuine passion for helping others succeed
Comfortable on camera and on stage
Former developers, technical writers, and teachers all succeed in DevRel

Companies that hire DevRel

Any company whose customers are developers needs DevRel. These are the main categories.

API-first companiesStripe, Twilio, Cloudflare

Developer toolsGitHub, Postman, Figma

Cloud platformsAWS, Google Cloud, Azure

Any company selling to developersIf developers are the customer, DevRel exists

How to break in without DevRel experience

DevRel is one of the most portfolio-driven careers in tech. Your content is your resume.

1Write technical tutorials on your blog or Medium

2Speak at local meetups or online events

3Contribute to open-source documentation

4Build a project that uses an API and share it publicly

5DevRel portfolios are content portfolios — what have you created?

Salary

DevRel compensation is competitive with other senior technical roles. Ranges below are for the US market and Israel.

Role

US market

Israel

Entry-level Developer Advocate

$80–100k USD

₪25–35k/month

Senior Developer Advocate

$140–180k USD

₪40–60k/month

Explore more

See all tech career tracks

DevRel is one path. Explore the full landscape of tech roles — from product management to data science to engineering.

Explore all tech career tracks