That's exactly what I do each autumn: Update to the macOS version from autumn last year.
So far I was fine with it though of course sometimes it's annoying to get the latest XCode (and iOS sdk) version for development, so I have to resort to a VM from time to time.
I've kind of indirect experience: my girlfriend is an iOS developer, and has been using it on her only Mac for a while.
In the beginning it was awful for her. A lot of failures. However, after a couple of months it became quite stable, and she stopped complaining. The only thing that was kind of a nightmare was Xcode.
I'm updating it, and if I were you, I'd update right away too. There are many improvements.
Been better than Big Sur so far for me, on 16". Have had temperature issues with Big Sur, resulting in decreased perf due to clocking down (even with TG Pro). Now consistently 5-10 degrees cooler and less fan noise. Using "Intel Power gadget" to see the CPU frequency.
> Ironically I just upgraded to Big Sur yesterday from Catalina.
I intended to do the same this morning and literally witnessed the "Upgrade Now" change from Big Sur to Monterey as I was about to click it. Took me a while to find the appropriate link for Big Sur in the Mac App Store.
The beta was terrible, up to memory leaks in applications in the latest release candidate. As a new user I under-estimated the amount of irritating bugs they would ship. I sure hope the release is better.
It's been pretty good, although it still has some strange bugs, but those might be a me problem. Namely, Mission Control crashes on me about 15 times a day. I have to 'killall Dock' to bring it back. Also, using Cmd-Space to launch apps is janky -- if I type say Saf, it will say "Safari.app" for about .7 seconds and then the autocomplete goes away. So I have to enter in those .7 seconds.
Other than those two things, it's been pretty solid lately.
SharePlay to Mac is utterly broken, see my other comment.
Other than that, it seems more stable and faster than Big Sur, and that's without a clean install. Notes used to take 4 bounces to open on M1, now opens instantly. Haven't seen any crashing. No broken features that aren't brand new. I've only found one bug: Safari reopens private windows even if you turn that off. But no problem if you don't use Safari.
If it is your work machine than you probably shouldn't upgrade right away, give it a week or two (esp. if you work with old/outdated dependencies or packages). For personal machines I would be less cautious.
Have been using since June and haven't ran into any bugs/issues that prevents me from doing work. Unlike previous macOS betas were often there was at least one or two that would break things.
So far I was fine with it though of course sometimes it's annoying to get the latest XCode (and iOS sdk) version for development, so I have to resort to a VM from time to time.
Helpful website: https://xcodereleases.com/