Virtual Threads: New Foundations for High-Scale Java Applications

Posted on September 23, 2022

Java 19 brings the first preview of virtual threads to the Java platform; this is the main deliverable of OpenJDKs Project Loom. This is one of the biggest changes to come to Java in a long time -- and at the same time, is an almost imperceptible change. Virtual threads fundamentally change how the Java runtime interacts with the underlying operating system, eliminating significant impediments to scalability -- but change relatively little about how we build and maintain concurrent programs. There is almost zero new API surface, and virtual threads behave almost exactly like the threads we already know. Indeed, to use virtual threads effectively, there is more unlearning than learning to be done …

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