[klibertp]

The lack of REPL compounds with long compilation times, which is practically a feature of C++ and not going to go away anytime soon. The effect is that, when you explore a new API or need to tune parameters to some function call deep in the call stack, you're an order of magnitude slower than with Python (or Lisp, Scala, F#, Haskell, or even Nim or plain C (b/c compilation times)).

If you know exactly what you need to write, you're just as quick in C++ as in Python, that's true. Programming is mostly about learning what to write, though, and here C++ loses.

[kamaal]

If you are developing your code as a small tiny functions getting stitched later. Then writing unit test cases will solve this problem too.

[klibertp]

No, it will help with lack of REPL but not with long compilation times. Long compilation times are bad across the board. Go advertises "fast compilation" as one of its key features for a reason.

EDIT: Not to mention, if you write your code as a lot of tiny functions you could just as well write it in C. Once you go for classes and templates, that's where C++ power is visible, but that's also where its compile times suck.

[TeMPOraL]

Writing unit tests is nowhere near a replacement for a proper REPL.