AI promised less work, developers say in reality it is forcing them to work more

One of the promises of AI is that humans will need to work less and hence have more time to focus on higher-level or creative tasks. The reality, however, is different. Developers tell India Today Tech that AI has added to their workload.AI was supposed to reduce your workload, but is that really the case? (Representational image made with AI)In November 2023, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates floated the idea of a future where, thanks to machines and AI, you would have to work less. “If you eventually get a society where you only have to work three days a week or something, that’s probably OK if the machines can make all the food and the stuff and we don’t have to work as hard,” he said at the time. This was largely the consensus within Silicon Valley when it came to selling you AI tools — you will need to work less.Nowhere has this promise been pushed more than in the tech industry. As newer and smarter AI tools like Claude Code and ChatGPT Codex have come online, AI companies and AI evangelists have sold a dream: developers and software engineers can work less on mundane work because AI can do it all. Instead, they can save time and then can spend it on leisure, higher-level work, or on creative stuff.The reality, as India Today Tech learns from many software developers who are part of the industry, is quite different from the utopian dream. AI is not only leading to layoffs in the tech industry, it is even putting employees who are still fortunate to have their jobs, under immense work pressure. In most cases, AI has actually led to an increase in workload for developers and software engineers, as they spend more hours working on issues often brought about due to the introduction of AI.Same time, more workShubham, who works at one of the FAANG companies (Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Nvidia, and Google) and who does not want to reveal his surname because of privacy reasons, tells India Today Tech, “We are able to work quickly but the work has increased. So at the end we're working for the same amount of time.” He is lucky, though. Because for Ankita, a senior software developer in Bengaluru, AI has increased the work because of what her company expects from employees once such tools are available to them.“AI has helped to reduce the workload, but our managers have made sure that we have enough work,” says Ankita. “Their expectation is if there is AI, a task will be done in half time. Or it will be done in 30 per cent time. So the workload is increasing compared to the time.” Rajat, a senior software developer, says that one should not have expected to have less work to begin with, no matter how good AI tools become. “What's free time at work? If you have to work for 9 hours a day, you have to work for 9 hours. What's the concept of free time in that? That does not make sense,” he tells India Today Tech. “It's not like if 10 hours of work is done in 4 hours, then in the remaining 6 hours, let's do something else. It's not like people are sitting idle because of AI.”Ankita, on the other hand, says that with AI she might be working more than before. “For the past 3 months, I have been working for 15-16 hours every day. So, it has increased. I don't get free time at all. And then you have to cope up with what is going on in your organisation, what is going on outside in terms of AI,” she explains.“To stay updated, you have to keep yourself up to date. If there is some training or workshops (on AI technologies) in the office, you have to attend them. After that, if time is left, you work more,” she says.Although AI tools have increasingly become part of the tech industry, in other fields too, they don’t seem to be lessening the workload. “AI doesn’t directly reduce my workload, but it does make the process faster,” says Diya Jana, graphic designer at Oddly Studios. “However, the output isn’t always accurate or perfect, so I often have to refine my prompts and make corrections manually. While AI helps with efficiency, it doesn’t necessarily reduce the overall workload.”Managers want AI use, but tokens are cappedA key part in driving AI adoption are managers and the leadership, who want their staff to use more of these tools. “The whole leadership I believe (are encouraging AI use),” Shubham notes. “We also have some projects which are expected to be completed solely by AI, that is, the engineer is only supposed to give prompts. Rest all the design, code, testing should be done by AI.”The idea is sound, but here too, there is something that adds to the woes of developers and software engineers. AI tools are available, but the usage is capped. And yet, the leadership expects that the work should happen faster. “The leadership feels that employees now have AI and that money is being spent on these AI tools. So they should be faster and should be able to do more work,” Ankita adds.In reality, with tens of variables, the results do not always reflect the perfect outcome and employees are often given the blame for it. Token capping is actually a big pain point for employees.In Ankita’s case, her company has placed a hard cap on AI tokens. “They have given us $250 (roughly Rs 24,000) worth of tokens per month. If you use it extensively, let's say POCs, or not even extensively, like in normal work, or if you work a little bit here and there, let's say POC or on-call, where there is a little more deep dive, at that time, in the half of the month, our tokens get over,” she explains. “Then the managers keep asking why it didn't work, why it didn't work. So, obviously, if you have given less tokens, it won't work. So, the workload is more.”Still not everywhereWhile AI is being used and in some cases speeding up the work, not all tasks can be done by AI completely. Kaushiki, system tester at TCS, explains there is time before AI can actually be meaningful. “AI has not made a significant change in the way we work as our project relies heavily on manual testing which is carried out on an internal platform,” she tells India Today Tech.Similarly, an Amazon Logistics Germany employee tells India Today Tech they were facing problems with a new AI system to scan damaged packages. “Sometimes the AI says the (scanned) package is fine or it doesn’t need repacking when from a human eye it’s very evident it does,” they say. “There one has to manually override it which takes time. But it adds problems in the delivery process where the delivery driver might have to wait 5-6 minutes more to collect their order which in turn makes delivery time longer for the customer.”Not everyone, though, agrees with the notion that AI is not helpful. Rajat, for example, says “If you are smart enough, then you will reduce your workload by using AI. If you are not smart and want AI to do all the work for you, then AI will increase your workload.”In case you are wondering whether this may just be a transition phase, and AI may help give you that much-wanted three-day work week, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman might have the answer for you. "We're all going to be much busier than we thought we were supposed to be in a post-superintelligence world,” he said on the Relentless podcast last month. “We're still going to complain about it, but secretly we're going to be happy.”That is, instead of getting a four-day workweek, you may have to work more. Why? Altman says "our expectations go up (and) we always want more.”- EndsPublished By: Armaan AgarwalPublished On: Aug 18, 2026 08:03 IST