I have recently seen a lot of rhetoric about this study that shows that developers take longer to code with AI compared to without AI.
However, speed isn’t the whole story.
The real benefit is that AI finishes your thoughts. You start writing or coding and it carries the thread to completion. That means less mental juggling, less half-baked ideas, less cognitive strain.
AI is not just an accelerator, it is a way to reduce the cost of thinking. That is what actually makes you more productive.