Oracle has released the latest version of its popular programming language and development platform, Java 20 (Oracle JDK 20), in India. This version contains a plethora of improvements in performance, stability, and security, including platform enhancements that can increase developers’ productivity and promote innovation and growth in their organizations. The company highlighted these features of Java 20 at the Java Developer Day—which is being held at the Oracle DevLive Level Up event in California.

In a press release Prasad Subramanian, Senior Software Development Director, of Oracle India said, “At Oracle, we have always believed in building a collaborative relationship with the developer community and ensuring overall innovation for organisations. The latest announcement of Java 20 is a testimony of the very same commitment as we continue to fulfil our promise of utmost performance.As the country steadily moves towards increased technology acceptance, there is a need for holistic, secure and stable offerings.” 

“For more than 25 years, Java has empowered developers to design and build the next generation of robust, scalable, and secure applications,” said Georges Saab, senior vice president of development, Java Platform and chair, OpenJDK Governing Board, Oracle. 

The most recent version of the Java Development Kit (JDK) includes seven JDK Enhancement Proposals (JEPs) that offer updates and enhancements. The majority of these updates are new features that build upon previous releases, improving their functionality.

JDK 20 offers a variety of improvements that have been implemented from OpenJDK project Amber. Additionally, enhancements from OpenJDK Project Panama, which interconnect the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) and native code, have been included, such as the Foreign Function & Memory API and Vector API. Furthermore, the release includes features from Project Loom, such as Scoped Values, Virtual Threads, and Structured Concurrency, which will greatly simplify the process of developing, maintaining, and monitoring high-throughput, concurrent applications.

Jay Lyman, senior research analyst, S&P Global Market Intelligence expressed how organisations today are under pressure to maximise resource efficiency forcing developers to find tools that can simplify application development while also ensuring that their organizations meet their IT security and compliance objectives.

“Digital transformation leaders say they’re more focused on improving time to market and the agility that can be gained with better tools that can accelerate their organization’s application development initiatives,” he added.

Significant updates in Java 20 are:

The latest version of Java, JDK 20, brings various improvements, including language updates and enhancements related to Project Loom, Project Panama, and other preview features. 

For language improvements, JEP 432 and JEP 433 provide more powerful and composable data queries through record patterns and pattern matching for switch. 

Project Loom introduces scoped values, virtual threads, and structured concurrency to simplify multithreaded programming, accelerate application development, and enhance observability. 

Project Panama includes foreign function and memory API and vector API, enabling Java programs to interoperate with code and data outside of the JVM and increase performance.

These updates are the outcome of the collaboration between Oracle engineers and the global Java developer community via OpenJDK and JCP. Moreover, Java 20 is supported by Java Management Service, which is an Oracle Cloud Infrastructure service that helps organizations manage Java runtimes and applications on-premises or on any cloud from a single platform.