I get a lot of flak for this, but there are definitely times I miss XML for certain things and find it way easier to work with than JSON or YAML. I definitely understand some of the backlash against XML that happened a decade or so ago and definitely don't want to return to the days of half of a Java application being XML code.
I think JSON is more efficient to write, but XML often ends up being more efficient to read due to comments and the fact that XML tags often give you better context. I think most programmers (myself included) tend to heavily optimize towards writability when we should think about readability a little more.
An example of this is ElasticSearch, where your queries are in JSON and often end up tons of levels deep - it is super easy to get lost in a sea of closing brackets, whereas XML would let you add comments in and the fact that closing tags have names in them would give you better context about what you were doing.
I think JSON is more efficient to write, but XML often ends up being more efficient to read due to comments and the fact that XML tags often give you better context. I think most programmers (myself included) tend to heavily optimize towards writability when we should think about readability a little more.
An example of this is ElasticSearch, where your queries are in JSON and often end up tons of levels deep - it is super easy to get lost in a sea of closing brackets, whereas XML would let you add comments in and the fact that closing tags have names in them would give you better context about what you were doing.