am I a Senior yet?

So many of you ask me: “Dragos, when do I know I'm a Senior dev?”

Is it my title?

Or my salary?

Well, you probably know developers who have a Senior title… But in reality they are still Juniors!

And while there’s no absolute Senior Dev definition out there… 

Here are 5 signs that you are close to getting there(80% of devs will fail at #3):

1. You can ship stuff without perfect instructions

Most developers freeze when requirements are unclear.

Or when the Figma mockup is not ready.

If you can deal with ambiguity… And still push things forward and deliver features… 

Then you are on your way to Senior Dev.

Senior Dev tip: If you struggle to deliver when requirements are not clear, ask yourself why? Is it really the requirements? Or certain knowledge gaps? Or maybe you don’t know enough about the codebase you are working on…. Now, go and fix that :) 

2. Most of your code is kinda boring (on purpose)

Senior devs don’t need to write fancy abstractions to prove their ego. 

The love code they will understand 6 months from now. Boring code is sexy code. 

Ohh, this brings me to number 7…

3. You delete more code than you write

Juniors love to add on more and more code to the project. They feel like the more stuff they add, the more stuff they know.

The way to Senior is by subscription, not addition.

Seniors love to get rid of stuff.

Refactoring. Deleting. And even removing entire layers from the application if not needed. 

4. You are not afraid of AI (and actually pissed by all the mess it produces)

If you saw through the marketing smoke behind “AI-coding”.

And you understand LLMs for what they are: deep learning algorithms, not real intelligence.

You know AI is often wrong… And you never push AI written code to production without checking it first... Then you are close to Senior, my friend!

Because despite all the BS you see online… In 2026, it will be pretty obvious that the future is not going to be “vibe-coded”.

5. You stopped chasing frameworks long time ago

You spend more time reading ECMAScript Language Specification than React docs. 

You’ve mastered core JS fundamentals (performance, memory, async, etc).

In fact, you are more interested in how sh**t actually works under the hood… Then on how s shiny framework implements it.

Show me a Senior Dev, and I will show you a master of the fundamentals!

6. You can make mistakes – in public - and survive 🤪

You are close to Senior Dev if you made the wrong technical choice... Shipped it to production. Messed it up. And got criticized for it! 

Then you admitted it, and fixed it back :)  

Senior devs have a thick skin. 

They don't take things personally. They don’t doubt themselves... Instead, they listen so they know where to improve (same during technical interviews). 

7. You can explain complex technical topics, in simple terms – to a non-technical person

If you can’t do this, it is not because is complex… But because you don’t understand it well enough. 

You product manager (or your client) doesn't care about Core Web Vitals or compression algorithms, or caching... But they do care about the application being fast.

If you can't explain these terms to them like they were a 5 years old...

Then is time to get back to the books… And master that thing! 

8. You know best practices, but focus more on “trade-offs”

Juniors try to hack things. 

Mid-levels try to push best practices into everything. 

Seniors know the hacks, know best practices… But they focus more on “trade-offs”. 

They know there is no “best way”... Only trade-offs and context. The most Senior question you can ask is: “What’s the best way to do this in the given context?”

And context is not only technical.

But also about the team and business domain. 

9. You can stick to things when they get hard and boring (projects, jobs, etc) 

You don’t have to love software engineering to be a great developer.

You don’t need to code on the weekends. You don’t need to sacrifice your family life, hobbies or mental health. 

You only need to stick to software for enough time.

Get 1% better every single day (that’s 38x better in a year!).

A lot of stuff will go wrong in your developer career... You will probably get fired at some point. You will miss deadlines. You will mess up projects. 

Not matter what happens, you have to keep your head up. 

Try to learn from mistakes, then put them to sleep and move forward. In BJJ they say “a black belt is just a white belt who never quit”.

Senior devs are just Junior devs who didn’t quit. 

If you want to get to Senior… To build a 20 or even 30 years career… Then resilience, patience and consistency are the best skills you can develop. 

Ohh which brings me to our call to action:

Do you want to make the most out of this winter holiday? To build the foundations that will put you ahead in 2026? 

Then book a call with me here. 

We’ll map out 2026 for you so you can make it your best year yet as a software engineer! 

Last week alone, we had one developer tripling their income... Another one just got an offer after 2 months of working together (he's been unemployed for over a year). Some other students are getting Senior promotions at a time when their colleagues are getting laid off. 

If you are a JavaScript Engineer looking to level up in the most efficient way, what Bogdan and I built might be the thing you need to get to a whole new level 🔥

👉 Book a call and let's talk. 

Hope you folks are doing fine and well... Wishing you an amazing week ahead!

Talk soon,

Dragos