Java version history

In September 2017, Mark Reinhold, chief Architect of the Java Platform, proposed to change the release train to "one feature release every six months" rather than the current two-year schedule,[9][10] and later the proposal took effect.

The first version was released on January 23, 1996.[11][12] The first stable version, JDK 1.0.2, is called Java 1.[12]

Major additions in the release on February 19, 1997 included:[13]

• an extensive retooling of the AWT event model
• inner classes added to the language
• JavaBeans
• JDBC
• RMI
• reflection which supported Introspection only, no modification at runtime was possible. (The ability to modify objects reflectively was added in J2SE 1.2, by introducing the AccessibleObject class and its subclasses such as the Field class.)
• JIT (Just In Time) compiler on Microsoft Windows platforms, produced for JavaSoft by Symantec
• Internationalization and Unicode support originating from Taligent[14]

Codename Playground

The release on December 8, 1998 and subsequent releases through J2SE 5.0 were rebranded retrospectively Java 2 and the version name "J2SE" (Java 2 Platform, Standard Edition) replaced JDK to distinguish the base platform from J2EE (Java 2 Platform, Enterprise Edition) and J2ME (Java 2 Platform, Micro Edition). This was a very significant release of Java as it tripled the size of the Java platform to 1520 classes in 59 packages. Major additions included:[15]

• strictfp keyword
• the Swing graphical API was integrated into the core classes
• Sun's JVM was equipped with a JIT compiler for the first time
• Java plug-in
• Java IDL, an IDL implementation for CORBA interoperability
• Collections framework

Codename Kestrel

The most notable changes in the May 8, 2000 release were:[16][17]

• HotSpot JVM included (the HotSpot JVM was first released in April 1999 for the J2SE 1.2 JVM)
• RMI was modified to support optional compatibility with CORBA
• Java Naming and Directory Interface (JNDI) included in core libraries (previously available as an extension)
• Java Platform Debugger Architecture (JPDA)
• JavaSound
• Synthetic proxy classes

Codename Merlin

The February 6, 2002 release was the first release of the Java platform developed under the Java Community Process as JSR 59. Major changes included:[18][19]

• Language changes
  • assert keyword (specified in JSR 41)
• Library improvements
  • Regular expressions modeled after Perl regular expressions
  • Exception chaining allows an exception to encapsulate original lower-level exception
  • Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) support
  • Non-blocking I/O (Java) (named NIO) (specified in JSR 51)
  • Logging API (specified in JSR 47)
  • Image I/O API for reading and writing images in formats like JPEG and PNG
  • Integrated XML parser and XSLT processor (JAXP) (specified in JSR 5 and JSR 63)
  • Integrated security and cryptography extensions (JCE, JSSE, JAAS)
  • Java Web Start included (Java Web Start was first released in March 2001 for J2SE 1.3) (specified in JSR 56)
  • Preferences API (java.util.prefs)

Public support and security updates for Java 1.4 ended in October 2008. Paid security updates for Oracle customers ended in February 2013.[20]

Codename Tiger

The release on September 30, 2004 was originally numbered 1.5, which is still used as the internal version number. The number was changed to "better reflect the level of maturity, stability, scalability and security of the J2SE".[21] This version was developed under JSR 176.

J2SE 5.0 entered its end-of-public-updates period on April 8, 2008; updates are no longer available to the public as of November 3, 2009. Updates were available to paid Oracle customers until May 2015.[1]

Tiger added a number of significant new language features:[22][23]

• Generics: provides compile-time (static) type safety for collections and eliminates the need for most typecasts (type conversion) (specified by JSR 14)
• Metadata: also called annotations; allows language constructs such as classes and methods to be tagged with additional data, which can then be processed by metadata-aware utilities (specified by JSR 175)
• Autoboxing/unboxing: automatic conversions between primitive types (such as int) and primitive wrapper classes (such as Integer) (specified by JSR 201)
• Enumerations: the enum keyword creates a typesafe, ordered list of values (such as Day.MONDAY, Day.TUESDAY, etc.); previously this could only be achieved by non-typesafe constant integers or manually constructed classes (typesafe enum pattern) (specified by JSR 201)
• Varargs: the last parameter of a method can now be declared using a type name followed by three dots (e.g. void drawtext(String... lines)); in the calling code any number of parameters of that type can be used and they are then placed in an array to be passed to the method, or alternatively the calling code can pass an array of that type
• Enhanced for each loop: the for loop syntax is extended with special syntax for iterating over each member of either an array or any Iterable, such as the standard Collection classes (specified by JSR 201)
• Improved semantics of execution for multi-threaded Java programs; the new Java memory model addresses issues of complexity, effectiveness, and performance of previous specifications[24]
• Static imports

There were also the following improvements to the standard libraries:

• Automatic stub generation for RMI objects
• Swing: New skinnable look and feel, called synth
• The concurrency utilities in package java.util.concurrent[25]
• Scanner class for parsing data from various input streams and buffers

Java 5 is the last release of Java to officially support Microsoft Windows 98 and Windows ME,[26] while Windows Vista was the newest version of Windows that J2SE 5 was supported on prior to Java 5 going end-of-life in October of 2009.[20]

Java 5 Update 5 (1.5.0_05) is the last release of Java to work on Windows 95 (with Internet Explorer 5.5 installed) and Windows NT 4.0.[27]

Java 5 was first available on Apple Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger)[28] and was the default version of Java installed on Apple Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard).

Public support and security updates for Java 1.5 ended in November 2009. Paid security updates for Oracle customers ended in April 2015.

Codename Mustang

As of the version released on December 11, 2006, Sun replaced the name "J2SE" with Java SE and dropped the ".0" from the version number.[47] Internal numbering for developers remains 1.6.0.[48]

This version was developed under JSR 270.

During the development phase, new builds including enhancements and bug fixes were released approximately weekly. Beta versions were released in February and June 2006, leading up to a final release that occurred on December 11, 2006.

Major changes included in this version:[49][50]

• Support for older Win9x versions dropped; unofficially, Java 6 Update 7 was the last release of Java shown to work on these versions of Windows. This is believed to be due to the major changes in Update 10.
• Scripting Language Support (JSR 223): Generic API for tight integration with scripting languages, and built-in Mozilla JavaScript Rhino integration.
• Dramatic performance improvements for the core platform,[51][52] and Swing.
• Improved Web Service support through JAX-WS (JSR 224).
• JDBC 4.0 support (JSR 221).
• Java Compiler API (JSR 199): an API allowing a Java program to select and invoke a Java Compiler programmatically.
• Upgrade of JAXB to version 2.0: Including integration of a StAX parser.
• Support for pluggable annotations (JSR 269).[53]
• Many GUI improvements, such as integration of SwingWorker in the API, table sorting and filtering, and true Swing double-buffering (eliminating the gray-area effect).
• JVM improvements include: synchronization and compiler performance optimizations, new algorithms and upgrades to existing garbage collection algorithms, and application start-up performance.

Java 6 can be installed to Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard) running on 64-bit (Core 2 Duo and higher) processor machines.[54] Java 6 is also supported by both 32-bit and 64-bit machines running Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard).

Java 6 reached the end of its supported life in February 2013, at which time all public updates, including security updates, were scheduled to be stopped.[55][56] Oracle released two more updates to Java 6 in March and April 2013, which patched some security vulnerabilities.[57][58]

Java 7 (codename Dolphin[137]) is a major update that was launched on July 7, 2011[138] and was made available for developers on July 28, 2011.[139] The development period was organized into thirteen milestones; on June 6, 2011, the last of the thirteen milestones was finished.[139][140] On average, 8 builds (which generally included enhancements and bug fixes) were released per milestone. The feature list at the OpenJDK 7 project lists many of the changes.

Additions in Java 7 include:[141]

• JVM support for dynamic languages, with the new invokedynamic bytecode under JSR-292,[142] following the prototyping work currently done on the Multi Language Virtual Machine
• Compressed 64-bit pointers[143] (available in Java 6 with -XX:+UseCompressedOops)[144]
• These small language changes (grouped under a project named Coin):[145]

• Strings in switch[146]
• Automatic resource management in try-statement[147]
• Improved type inference for generic instance creation, aka the diamond operator <>[148]
• Simplified varargs method declaration[149]
• Binary integer literals[150]
• Allowing underscores in numeric literals[151]
• Catching multiple exception types and rethrowing exceptions with improved type checking[152]

• Concurrency utilities under JSR 166[153]
• New file I/O library (defined by JSR 203) adding support for multiple file systems, file metadata and symbolic links. The new packages are java.nio.file, java.nio.file.attribute and java.nio.file.spi[154][155]
• Timsort is used to sort collections and arrays of objects instead of merge sort
• Library-level support for elliptic curve cryptography algorithms
• An XRender pipeline for Java 2D, which improves handling of features specific to modern GPUs
• New platform APIs for the graphics features originally implemented in version 6u10 as unsupported APIs[156]
• Enhanced library-level support for new network protocols, including SCTP and Sockets Direct Protocol
• Upstream updates to XML and Unicode
• Java deployment rule sets[157]

Lambda (Java's implementation of lambda functions), Jigsaw (Java's implementation of modules), and part of Coin were dropped from Java 7, and released as part of Java 8 (except for Jigsaw, which was released in Java 9).[158][159]

Java 7 was the default version to download on java.com from April 2012 until Java 8 was released.[160]

Java 8 was released on March 18, 2014,[224][225] and included some features that were planned for Java 7 but later deferred.[226]

Work on features was organized in terms of JDK Enhancement Proposals (JEPs).[227]

• JSR 335, JEP 126: Language-level support for lambda expressions (officially, lambda expressions; unofficially, closures) under Project Lambda[228] and default methods (virtual extension methods)[229][230][231] which allow the addition of methods to interfaces without breaking existing implementations. There was an ongoing debate in the Java community on whether to add support for lambda expressions.[232][233] Sun later declared that lambda expressions would be included in Java and asked for community input to refine the feature.[234] Supporting lambda expressions also enables functional-style operations on streams of elements, such as MapReduce-inspired transformations on collections. Default methods allow an author of an API to add new methods to an interface without breaking the old code using it. Although it was not their primary intent,[229] default methods also allow multiple inheritance of behavior (but not state).

• JSR 223, JEP 174: Project Nashorn, a JavaScript runtime which allows developers to embed JavaScript code within applications
• JSR 308, JEP 104: Annotation on Java types[235]
• Unsigned integer arithmetic[236]
• JSR 337, JEP 120: Repeating annotations[237]
• JSR 310, JEP 150: Date and time API[238]
• JEP 178: Statically-linked JNI libraries[239]
• JEP 153: Launch JavaFX applications (direct launching of JavaFX application JARs)[240]
• JEP 122: Remove the permanent generation[241]

Java 8 is not supported on Windows XP[242] but as of JDK 8 update 25, it can still be installed and run under Windows XP.[243] Previous updates of JDK 8 could be run under XP, but had to be installed after a forced installation by directly unzipping files from the installation executable.

From October 2014, Java 8 was the default version to download (and then again the download replacing Java 9) from the official website.[244] "Oracle will continue to provide Public Updates and auto updates of Java SE 8, Indefinitely for Personal Users, and January 2019 for Commercial Users".[2]

Java SE 9 was made available on September 21, 2017,[295] due to controversial acceptance of the current implementation of Project Jigsaw by Java Executive Committee,[296] which led Oracle to fix some open issues and concerns, and to refine some critical technical questions. In the last days of June 2017, Java Community Process expressed nearly unanimous consensus on the proposed Module System scheme.[297]

• JSR 376: Modularization of the JDK under Project Jigsaw (Java Platform Module System)[159]
• JEP 222: JShell: The Java Shell (a Java REPL)[298]
• JEP 295: Ahead-of-time compilation[299]
• JEP 268: XML catalogs[300]
• JEP 266: More concurrency updates.[301] It includes a Java implementation of Reactive Streams,[302] including a new Flow class[303] that included the interfaces previously provided by Reactive Streams[304]
• JEP 193: Variable handles:[305] define a standard means to invoke the equivalents of various java.util.concurrent.atomic and sun.misc.Unsafe operations
• JEP 282: jlink: The Java Linker:[306] create a tool that can assemble and optimize a set of modules and their dependencies into a custom run-time image. It effectively allows to produce a fully usable executable including the JVM to run it
• JavaDB was removed from JDK[307]
• JEP 263: HiDPI graphics: automatic scaling and sizing[308]
• JEP 254: Compact Strings[309]
• JEP 213: Milling Project Coin[310]
  • Allow @SafeVarargs on private instance methods
  • Allow effectively-final variables to be used as resources in the try-with-resources statement
  • Allow diamond with anonymous classes if the argument type of the inferred type is denotable
  • Complete the removal, begun in Java SE 8, of underscore from the set of legal identifier names
  • Support for private methods in interfaces

The first Java 9 release candidate was released on August 9, 2017.[311] The first stable release of Java 9 was on September 21, 2017.[312]

OpenJDK 10 was released on March 20, 2018, with twelve new features confirmed.[321] Among these features were:

• JEP-286: Local-Variable Type Inference
• JEP-296: Consolidate the JDK Forest into a Single Repository
• JEP-304: Garbage-Collector Interface
• JEP-307: Parallel Full GC for G1
• JEP-310: Application Class-Data Sharing
• JEP-312: Thread-Local Handshakes
• JEP-313: Remove the Native-Header Generation Tool (javah)
• JEP-314: Additional Unicode Language-Tag Extensions
• JEP-316: Heap Allocation on Alternative Memory Devices
• JEP-317: Experimental Java-Based JIT Compiler
• JEP-319: Root Certificates
• JEP-322: Time-Based Release Versioning

JDK 11 was released on September 25, 2018 and the version is currently open for bug fixes. It offers LTS, or Long Term Support. Among others, Java 11 includes a number of new features, such as:[327]

• JEP-181: Nest-Based Access Control
• JEP-309: Dynamic Class-File Constants
• JEP-315: Improve Aarch64 Intrinsics
• JEP-318: Epsilon: A No-Op Garbage Collector
• JEP-320: Remove the Java EE and CORBA Modules
• JEP-321: HTTP Client (Standard)
• JEP-323: Local-Variable Syntax for Lambda Parameters
• JEP-324: Key Agreement with Curve25519 and Curve448
• JEP-327: Unicode 10
• JEP-328: Flight Recorder
• JEP-329: ChaCha20 and Poly1305 Cryptographic Algorithms
• JEP-330: Launch Single-File Source-Code Programs
• JEP-331: Low-Overhead Heap Profiling
• JEP-332: Transport Layer Security (TLS) 1.3
• JEP-333: ZGC: A Scalable Low-Latency Garbage Collector (Experimental)
• JEP-335: Deprecate the Nashorn JavaScript Engine
• JEP-336: Deprecate the Pack200 Tools and API

A number of features from previous releases were dropped; in particular, Java applets and Java Web Start are no longer available. JavaFX, Java EE and CORBA modules have been removed from JDK[328]

JDK 12 was released on March 19, 2019. Among others, Java 12 includes a number of new features, such as:[340]

• JEP-189: Shenandoah: A Low-Pause-Time Garbage Collector (Experimental)
• JEP-230: Microbenchmark Suite
• JEP-325: Switch Expressions (Preview)
• JEP-334: JVM Constants API
• JEP-340: One AArch64 Port, Not Two
• JEP-341: Default CDS Archives
• JEP-344: Abortable Mixed Collections for G1
• JEP-346: Promptly Return Unused Committed Memory from G1

JDK 13 was released on September 17, 2019. Java 13 includes the following new features, as well as "hundreds of smaller enhancements and thousands of bug fixes".[344]

• JEP-350: Dynamic CDS Archives
• JEP-351: ZGC: Uncommit Unused Memory
• JEP-353: Reimplement the Legacy Socket API
• JEP-354: Switch Expressions (Preview)
• JEP-355: Text Blocks (Preview)

JDK 14 was released on March 17, 2020. Java 14 includes the following new features, as well as "hundreds of smaller enhancements and thousands of bug fixes".[349]

• JEP-305: Pattern Matching for instanceof (Preview)
• JEP-343: Packaging Tool (Incubator)
• JEP-345: NUMA-Aware Memory Allocation for G1
• JEP-349: JFR Event Streaming
• JEP-352: Non-Volatile Mapped Byte Buffers
• JEP-358: Helpful NullPointerExceptions
• JEP-359: Records (Preview)
• JEP-361: Switch Expressions (Standard)
• JEP-362: Deprecate the Solaris and SPARC Ports
• JEP-363: Remove the Concurrent Mark Sweep (CMS) Garbage Collector
• JEP-364: ZGC on macOS
• JEP-365: ZGC on Windows
• JEP-366: Deprecate the ParallelScavenge + SerialOld GC Combination
• JEP-367: Remove the Pack200 Tools and API
• JEP-368: Text Blocks (Second Preview)
• JEP-370: Foreign-Memory Access API (Incubator)

JDK 15 was released on September 15, 2020. Java 15 adds e.g. support for multi-line string literals (aka Text Blocks). The Shenandoah and Z garbage collectors (latter sometimes abbreviated ZGC) are now ready for use in production (i.e. no longer marked experimental). Support for Oracle's Solaris operating system (and SPARC CPUs) is dropped (while still available in e.g. Java 11). The Nashorn JavaScript Engine is removed. Also removed some root CA certificates.

• JEP-339: Edwards-Curve Digital Signature Algorithm (EdDSA)
• JEP-360: Sealed Classes (Preview)
• JEP-371: Hidden Classes
• JEP-372: Remove the Nashorn JavaScript Engine
• JEP-373: Reimplement the Legacy DatagramSocket API
• JEP-374: Disable and Deprecate Biased Locking
• JEP-375: Pattern Matching for instanceof (Second Preview)
• JEP-377: ZGC: A Scalable Low-Latency Garbage Collector
• JEP-378: Text Blocks
• JEP-379: Shenandoah: A Low-Pause-Time Garbage Collector
• JEP-381: Remove the Solaris and SPARC Ports
• JEP-383: Foreign-Memory Access API (Second Incubator)
• JEP-384: Records (Second Preview)
• JEP-385: Deprecate RMI Activation for Removal

JDK 16 is the current initial release candidate,[5] due out in March 2021. The Java implementation itself was and is still written in C++, while as of Java 16, more recent C++14 (but still not e.g. C++17) is allowed. The code is also moved to GitHub (dropping the Mercurial source control system).

• JEP-338: Vector API (Incubator)
• JEP-347: Enable C++14 Language Features
• JEP-357: Migrate from Mercurial to Git
• JEP-369: Migrate to GitHub
• JEP-376: ZGC: Concurrent Thread-Stack Processing
• JEP-380: Unix-Domain Socket Channels
• JEP-386: Alpine Linux Port
• JEP-387: Elastic Metaspace
• JEP-388: Windows/AArch64 Port
• JEP-389: Foreign Linker API (Incubator)
• JEP-390: Warnings for Value-Based Classes
• JEP-392: Packaging Tool
• JEP-393: Foreign-Memory Access API (Third Incubator)
• JEP-394: Pattern Matching for instanceof
• JEP-395: Records
• JEP-396: Strongly Encapsulate JDK Internals by Default
• JEP-397: Sealed Classes (Second Preview)

JDK 17 is the next long-term support (LTS) release now under active development,[358] due out in September 2021 if the current 6 month release cycles continue. Java 17 is expected to be the 2nd long-term support (LTS) release after Java 11 since switching to the new 6 month release cadence.

• Project Valhalla: Value types, objects without identity but with an efficient memory layout.
• Project Panama: Improved interoperability with native code, to enable Java source code to call functions and use data types from other languages, in a way that is easier and has better performance than today.
• Project Loom: Virtual threads, a lightweight user-mode scheduled alternative to standard OS managed threads. Virtual threads are mapped to OS threads in a many-to-many relationship, in contrast to the many-to-one relationship from the original green threads implementation in early versions of Java.

The officially supported Java platform, first developed at Sun and now stewarded by Oracle, is Java SE. Releases are based on the OpenJDK project, which is a free and open source project with an open development model. Other Java implementations exist, however—in part due to Java's early history as proprietary software, while some implementations were created to offer some benefits over the standard implementation, often the result of some area of academic or corporate-sponsored research. Many GNU/Linux distributions include builds of OpenJDK through the IcedTea project started by Red Hat, which provides an easier build and integration environment.

Visual J++ and the Microsoft Java Virtual Machine were created as incompatible implementations. After the Sun v. Microsoft lawsuit, Microsoft abandoned it and began work on the .NET platform.

Other proprietary Java implementations are available, such as Azul's Zing; additionally, Azul offers certified open source OpenJDK builds under the Zulu moniker.

Prior to the release of OpenJDK, while Sun's implementation was still proprietary, the GNU Classpath project was created to provide a free and open source implementation of the Java platform. Since the release of JDK 7, when OpenJDK became the official reference implementation, the original motivation for the GNU Classpath project almost completely disappeared and its last release was in 2012.

The Apache Harmony project was started shortly before the release of OpenJDK. After Sun's initial source code release, the Harmony project continued, working to provide an implementation under a permissive license, in contrast to the copyleft license chosen for OpenJDK. Google later developed Android and released it under a permissive license. Android incorporated parts of the Harmony project, supplemented with Google's own Dalvik virtual machine and ART. Apache Harmony has since been retired, and Google has switched its use of Harmony components with equivalent ones from OpenJDK.

Both Jikes and Jikes RVM are open source research projects that were developed by IBM.

Several other implementations exist that started as proprietary software but are now open source. IBM initially developed OpenJ9 as the proprietary J9,[360] but has since relicensed the project and donated it to the Eclipse Foundation. JRockit is a proprietary implementation that was acquired by Oracle and incorporated into subsequent OpenJDK versions.

• Official Java SE Downloads
• Early history of Java
• Full list of changes for J2SE 1.3
• Full list of changes for J2SE 1.4
• Full list of changes for J2SE 5.0
• Full list of changes for Java SE 6
• Mustang development site for Java SE 6
• Java SE 7 release notes
• Sun Java Supported versions and EOL
• Downloads archive for older version of Java