My 2026 Tech Stack is Boring as Hell (And That is the Point)
Source: Dev.to
I spent years chasing the shiny new thing. In 2026, I am betting on the most controversial architecture of all: Simplicity. I used to be a Resume Driven Developer.
You know the type. If a project didn't involve Kubernetes, three different cloud providers, a message queue, and a framework that was released last Tuesday, I wasn't interested. I wasn't building software; I was building a monument to my own ego.
And the result? My cloud bill was higher than my grocery bill, and I needed a map just to find where my user's password was stored. It is now 2026. The hype cycle is exhausting. AI tools generate code faster than we can debug it. Complexity is drowning us.
So, for this year, I am making a radical change. I am betting on the "Boring Stack". Here is why I am firing complexity, and why you probably should too.
You Are Not Google (And Neither Am I)
We fell for a lie. We looked at Netflix and Uber and thought: "They use Microservices, so I should too for my To-Do app."
But we forgot that they have 2,000 engineers. I have me, a coffee mug, and a deadline.
When you split your application into 10 tiny services, you don't remove complexity. You just move it from your code to your network. And debugging a network error at 2 AM is not my idea of a good time. This year, I am returning to the Majestic Monolith. One repo. One deploy. One database. If I want to find a bug, I don't need distributed tracing—I just need Ctrl+F.
The Stack I'm Actually Using
While everyone else is arguing about the latest meta-framework, here is what I am shipping production code with:
The Compute: A single VPS. No serverless cold starts. No hidden costs. Just a Linux box that runs forever. The Database: SQLite or Postgres. No fancy NoSQL document stores that require me to join data in the application layer. Relational data is beautiful. Let SQL do the work.
The Backend: A standard REST API. GraphQL is cool, but asking for specific fields isn't my bottleneck. Complexity is.
The Frontend: React (because I know it) without 50 extra libraries.
Is it scalable?
Stack Overflow runs on a monolith. Shopify runs on a monolith. Unless you are planning to onboard the entire population of Brazil tomorrow, a boring monolith is fine. Boring Software Makes Money
The biggest realization I had as a Senior Engineer is that users do not care about your tech stack.
They don't care if you are using Rust or Python. They don't care if your architecture is "event-driven." They care if the button works when they click it.
When you choose boring technology, you spend less time configuring Webpack and more time building features. Features get customers. Customers pay bills.
The Joy of "Finished"
There is a specific peace of mind that comes with using tools that are older than the interns on your team. When I use SQLite, I know it works. It has been tested on billions of devices. It doesn't break because of an npm update. It just sits there, reliably saving my data, asking for nothing in return. So, in 2026, keep your Kubernetes clusters and your edge-computing-serverless-functions.
I will be over here with my single server and my SQLite file, shipping products while you are still configuring your YAML files. What is the one "boring" tool you refuse to give up? Let me know in the comments. Templates let you quickly answer FAQs or store snippets for re-use. Are you sure you want to hide this comment? It will become hidden in your post, but will still be visible via the comment's permalink. Hide child comments as well For further actions, you may consider blocking this person and/or reporting abuse
