Coding alone and coding in a team/with others shouldn't be considered mutually exclusive. You can learn valuable things from both. You will most likely prefer o

Coding alone and coding in a team/with others shouldn't be considered mutually exclusive. You can learn valuable things from both. You will most likely prefer one over the other, though. Alone, you might be able to spend more time with the theory behind what you're doing, or learning from books, or learning things in your own time that are beneficial to you but not immediately applicable. You may also have a vastly increased responsibility, especially if by working alone you mean freelancing. This teaches you things you'd struggle to learn any other way. But then you go to work, surrounded by colleagues, and in a team, and all of a sudden there are all these people, who have a similar skill-set to you but different ways of applying it, and different ways of thinking. You learn to ask questions, and learn how to answer other people's technical questions verbally. You may also learn that your way of doing something can be done better. I prefer the team-work, personally, but that doesn't mean that I wouldn't, or hated, working alone. I instead found that what I'd taught myself was greatly strengthened by the experiences and alternative approaches expressed by colleagues who thought differently. I understood design patterns and javascript after a colleague typed out and walked through examples. He understood the event-loop and blocking after I demonstrated that in practice and let him question what I was doing. And, in reference to guynamedloren's post about burnout, working with others might allow them to give you some perspective on your own stresses and anxieties. They might have been there and understand, and help reassure you. They did for me, at work, but no one could stop me pushing myself too far when coding alone at home. If it's not for you though, it's not for you.