238 AI developers voted in one of the most established categories in the AI engineering stack. The results reveal a split between market adoption and innovation leadership.
The March 2026 IT Brand Pulse AI Brand Leader survey asked 238 members of the AI developer community to vote for Market Leader and Intelligence & Innovation Leader in AI Model Development Frameworks, one of 26 products in the AI Engineering stack. TensorFlow was voted Market Leader with 37.8% of votes, followed closely by PyTorch at 31.9%. However, PyTorch was voted Innovation Leader with 45.0% of votes compared to TensorFlow’s 29.8%.
This divergence suggests that while TensorFlow retains strong production and enterprise credibility, PyTorch is increasingly viewed as the platform driving forward new development paradigms, particularly in research, flexibility, and ease of use. The split between market adoption and innovation leadership makes this one of the most dynamic competitive landscapes in the AI Engineering stack. The IT Brand Pulse analyst team expects this two-horse race to continue as both frameworks evolve their approach to LLM training and deployment.
What Are AI Model Development Frameworks?
IT Brand Pulse defines AI Model Development Frameworks as software that enables developers to build, train, and deploy machine learning and deep learning models. These frameworks provide core capabilities such as tensor computation, automatic differentiation, model definition, training workflows, and hardware acceleration, forming the foundational layer of the AI development stack. AI Model Development Frameworks sits within the Development sub-layer of the broader AI Engineering stack, alongside Foundation Model Platforms, LLMOps Platforms, AI Agent Development Frameworks, and AI App Builder Platforms.
Download the Brand Leader Report for AI Model Development Frameworks.
