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Java 8

Status Long Term Support Release
Release Date 2014-03-18
EOL Date 2026-11
Latest Version 8u422
Class File Version 52.0
Unicode Version 6.2.0
API Changes Compare to 7 - 6 - 5 - 1.4 - 1.3 - 1.2 - 1.1 - 1.0
Documentation Release Notes, Language Spec, VM Spec, JavaDoc
SCM git

Java 8 finally added lambda syntax and method references as a modern language constructs. The main application within the JDK API is the new java.util.streams package. An initial set of common functional interfaces is shipped in the new package java.util.function.

The extremely useful Joda-Time library has been integrated into the JDK as a new package java.time. Instead of the mostly deprecated java.util.Date and java.util.Calendar classes we now have a modern and powerful API for calculations with dates and times.

New Features

Here are all new features in Java 8 by category. There is also of list of all features of all Java releases.

JVM

Language

API

Downloads

Vendor Product License Platform Downloads
Adoptium Eclipse Temurin GPLv2+CE
AdoptOpenJDK AdoptOpenJDK GPLv2+CE
Alibaba Dragonwell 8 GPLv2+CE
Amazon Corretto 8 GPLv2+CE
Azul Systems Zulu Builds of OpenJDK 8 GPLv2+CE
Azul Systems Azul Prime Commercial
  • linux-x64
  • linux-arm64
BellSoft Liberica GPLv2+CE
IBM IBM SDK, Java Technology Edition, Version 8 Commercial
IBM Semeru Runtime Open Edition, Version 8 GPLv2+CE
Oracle Oracle JDK 8 Commercial
Red Hat Red Hat build of OpenJDK 8 GPLv2+CE

Sandbox

Instantly compile and run Java 8 snippets without a local Java installation.

import java.util.stream.Stream; public class Java8 { public static void main(String[] args) { Stream.of("Hello", "Java", "8").map(String::toUpperCase).forEach(System.out::println); } }