Why Rust is the most Readable Language.

Have you ever tried contributing to an open-source project or even worked on a large code base with neck-breaking documentation? If you have done any of these, you would at least know the benefits of a readable language.

Sometimes, it is not even the programmers fault, your language just sucks; you’ve got multiple derefs here and there, or you have some piece of code that you can’t predict response type until runtime, and much more.

 I believe Rust has to be the most readable language there is right now, arguably. 

Why Rust Is the Most Readable Language

Here’s Why I Think Rust Is the Most Readable Language

Be Specific.

You know that thing most interpreted languages do: You can cast types implicitly. You have types switching from strings to numbers, from bigInts to small ones, and vice versa, implicitly. Although this is cool, it adds a layer of ambiguity to the code. 

You cannot easily know when a type may have changed or would even change, and since this is usually handled by their interpreter, it makes it harder to debug it, leaving you with totally unplanned behaviours, not like your interpreter would know.

No hidden behavior

let x: i32 = 10;  
let y: f64 = x; // ❌ Error: Cannot implicitly convert i32 to f64  
let y: f64 = x as f64; // ✅ Explicit conversion required

Pattern matching for clarity: This goes down to how patterns are handled. You can see how simple it is to read the code below: 

If you get Some value, do () else if you get None value do ().  This is super clean and easy to understand, without any blind spots, as match statements ensure you cover all possibilities, ensuring perfect code quality.

Example

match some_value {
    Some(v) => println!("Value: {}", v),
    None => println!("No value found"),
}

Ownership model enforces clear data flow

This is one of the biggest ones. Coming from a C background and then extensively using Python and JS, this was one of the hardest features for me to catch in this language. 

The ownership model ensures that you never have more than one owner of data in memory, allowing you to have a mental map of where each memory is handled, dropped, copied, referenced, created, and joined with lifetimes and scoped blocks. This makes reading Rust programs easy. 

Even though this is a very hard feature to understand, it is worth the neuron rewire. You should try it. 

Strong Typing and Type Inference

You know you do not have to specify types when declaring variables in Rust; your compiler would just infer it from the function return types, a large percent of the time.  

Because of Rust's strong type system, you do not need any nuisance of a solution to fix type issues, especially when serializing unstructured data.  

Due to its amazing type inference, you get amazing IDE suggestions, and I know in this age of vibe coding, it does not sound like much, but trust me, that is not the case all the time. 

Here are some benefits of this feature:

Prevents common runtime errors: As you can see, since this function has explicit types, you cannot mistakenly read this to take a u32 or a size, infact if you look at the second function it gets better it takes a declared custom wrapper type hence, you can be able to read the types of the input type as Minutes and Seconds, this ensures you never mistake types. 

Example:

fn add(x: i32, y: i32) -> i32 {
    x + y  // Rust ensures correct types are used
}
struct Minutes(u32);
struct Seconds(u32);
struct Time;
fn time(m: Minutes, s: Seconds) -> Time {
    // todo
}

Type inference reduces clutter while maintaining clarity: As you can see, the type definitions are not specified in the first code line, but specified in the second while calling sum. Since that type def means numbers must be i32s, this is useful, as you may not need to set types more efficiently in different parts of your code without explicitly spelling out the types.

Example:

let numbers = vec![1, 2, 3]; // Rust infers Vec<i32>
let sum: i32 = numbers.iter().sum(); // Explicit type when needed

Modern and Concise Syntax

Oh, the syntax is too verbose. Have you written Java or C or heck, even JS, lol?

But on a serious note, Rust does have one of the most complex yet most concise syntaxes. 

I am amazed at times at how much context the Rust programming language squeezes into a small code — maybe that is why it is so complex after all.

Expressive and minimal boilerplate

struct Person {
    name: String,
    age: u8,
}

impl Person {
    fn greet(&self) {
        println!("Hello, my name is {}", self.name);
    }
}

Clear function signatures with explicit return types

fn multiply(a: i32, b: i32) -> i32 {
    a * b  // No unnecessary return keyword
}

Clear method signatures: In Rust, you get very clear method signatures, even when in fact especially useful when you are writing a generic impl or struct. 

For example, the below code you can read it as when the Type of Animal is a Cow, then it would “mo” if it tried to speak, and if it is a Cat, it would “meow”. 

This design pattern is possible in Rust, making it very easy to read and find the part of the code base you may want to change. 

pub fn main() {
    let animal = Animal { animal: Cat };
    let word = animal.speak();
    println!("{}", word);
}

struct Animal<T> {
    animal: T
}

struct Cow;
struct Cat;

impl Animal<Cat> {
    fn speak(&self) -> String { 
        String::from("Meow")
    }
}

impl Animal<Cow> {
    fn speak(&self) -> String { 
        String::from("Moo")
    }
}

Borrow Checker and Memory Safety Without Garbage Collection

This is a no-brainer. Have you handled a segfault? If not, you won’t even get this; just move on or learn some actual language. Segfaults are the reason I learned Rust in the first place, so let me explain how memory safety and the borrow checker ensure easier writing.

No unexpected null pointer dereferencing:  Since you are always sure, nothing, I mean nothing without an unsafe block, can be pointing to an empty memory point, so you are always certain you are not mistakenly dropping memory somewhere. This allows you to build a sealed mental map of your program execution stack

Example: 

let maybe_value: Option<i32> = None;
println!("{}", maybe_value.unwrap()); // ❌ Compile-time error prevents crashes

No manual memory management like in C/C++: I can’t explain how many times I have made this mistake in C, of mistakenly freeing strings or not creating enough buffer for them in the first place. Boy, I cried, I’d rather fight the borrow checker than debug that mess.

Example:

let s = String::from("Hello");  
let s2 = s;  // Ownership moved, prevents double free
println!("{}", s); // ❌ Error: Value moved

Clear rules for references prevent hidden bugs

Example:

fn print_length(s: &String) {
    println!("{}", s.len());
} // No accidental modification or dangling pointer issues

Comprehensive Error Messages and Tooling

Tooling, God bless the compiler and the rust analyzer — the second depends on the first — to show you how powerful the compiler is, its extension plugin depends on it for almost everything, including error messages.

That, joined with rustfmt and clippy, would help you maintain a uniform writing pattern, making it easy for you to get used to the code style and quickly infer the next char like chatGPT would..

Example:

let x: i32 = "hello"; // ❌ Error: Expected `i32`, found `&str`

Rust error message:

expected `i32`, found `&str`
help: consider changing the type of `x` to `&str`

• rustfmt enforces a consistent, readable style

• Clippy suggests readability improvements.

Real-World Comparisons to Other Languages

Compared to Python, Rust has stronger typing but remains readable: This is such a big flex because, compared to Python, Rust has a very readable outline once projects start getting complex, even whilst keeping that sturdy typing

Python:

def add(a, b):
    return a + b  # No type safety

Rust:

fn add(a: i32, b: i32) -> i32 {
    a + b  // Ensures correct types
}

Compared to C++, Rust eliminates complex memory management issues: Correct me if I am wrong, but I prefer the second code; it is in one line and does one thing.

C++:

int* p = new int(5);
delete p;  // Manual memory management required

Rust:

let x = Box::new(5); // Memory is automatically managed

Compared to JavaScript (Rust’s strictness prevents hard-to-debug issues): Do not even mention this monster of a curse that front-end developers are burdened with. How is that even possible? Why did you add a string to a number?

JavaScript:

let x = "10" + 5;  // "105" (unexpected behavior)

Rust:

let x = "10".parse::<i32>().unwrap() + 5; // Ensures correct type

Conclusion

Rust prioritizes clarity, correctness, and maintainability through smart design choices that make it one of the most readable languages in the industry. It combines readable syntax + strong guarantees, which leads to fewer bugs and easier debugging for developers.

Because most Rust complex patterns are handled with ergonomic middle-level API's, you can safely work with buffers for vectors, structs, and handle errors without code looking too complex. 

The language's explicitness, safety, and modern syntax make everyday programming tasks more straightforward while still providing powerful guarantees, which is why many developers are switching to it for critical systems. When joined with its compiler and tooling, understanding any errors and how the entire code works is quite easy.

Bonus — personal story

Rodio is a cross-platform audio library for Rust, an amazing tool. Sometime last year, I wanted to contribute to that library, to cut the story short.

With the library being over 7k lines of pure code, no frameworks, I was certain it would take me a long time to figure out where the fix was, even though it was just some inline doc, something I did not mention in the article LOL, I was shocked, I was able to find it in a few minutes and draw a mind map of how the project worked.

I was able to make a PR in about a day or two just to show I understood the code base, I started working on adding a feature — Although I never finished this — and was even able to spot a human error in the programming logic and fix it and make a merged PR in a matter of hours (days actually but I did not spend alot of time on this so it is a matter of hours )  If it were not for rusts extreme readability, I would not be able to do this. 

So, if readability was your primary concern, scrap that excuse from your mind and start learning Rust. Check out this course on Rust so you will be off to a graceful start.

As always, if you have any questions, reach out to me on my linkedin