Only relevant experience matters, without this, most people won't even be shortlisted and won't get interviews. And if you want to switch to development from domains like testing, QA, automation, ERP, CRM, ETL, mainframe, etc, there is no option other than showing your work experience differently.

This is the information nobody will tell you properly. I have learnt this the hard way after being honest about my Automation QA experience in the core Java ecosystem at thousands of companies for over 3 years, and now its too late to lie about my work experience as a Java developer, despite having a generic designation at a WITCH company, where I worked at for over 3 years.

All those motivational videos, online courses, etc about hard work, dedication, passion, etc, are all WASTE if you don't have so-called relevant experience. Most HRs, Recruiters, etc, won't even bother to check your open source contributions, your portfolio projects, your solved DSA problems count, if you don't have relevant experience.

Most people who have switched to high-paying development domains lied about their tech stack, lied about their tech stack in work experience at service-based companies if coming from other non-development software domains like testing, QA, automation, ERP, CRM, ETL, mainframe, etc, and now sitting at 20-40 LPA packages at 3-4 yoe. Yes, they have worked hard, but they were not honest and ethical.

Its not about being evil/unethical anymore, its about survival, so one needs to whatever is possible to survive.