Java Conference 2024: Key Announcements and Ecosystem News

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Java Conference 2024: Key Announcements That Change the Game

In early December 2024, the largest annual conference on the Java programming language — JavaOne 2024 — took place. The event gathered over 10,000 participants from around the world: from ordinary developers to technical leaders from Oracle, Red Hat, and JetBrains. In this article, we have compiled the key announcements that will impact the ecosystem's development in the coming years.

JDK 22 and the Future of LTS Releases

The main event of the conference was the announcement of JDK 22 (GA — March 2025). Unlike previous versions, Oracle confirmed that JDK 22 will be a long-term support (LTS) version with support until 2032. Key innovations include:

Virtual Threads (Project Loom) — a stable implementation of lightweight threads for high-load servers. Virtual threads now work "out of the box" without additional configuration.
Pattern Matching for Records — improved syntax for decomposing records in conditional statements.
Foreign Function & Memory API (Preview) — safe calling of native libraries without JNI, simplifying integration with C/C++ code.

It was also announced that starting with JDK 22, a new release strategy will be introduced: an LTS version every two years, with intermediate releases receiving only a 6-month support cycle.

Spring Framework 7.0: Reactivity and AI

The VMware team presented Spring Framework 7.0 (release — Q2 2025). The main focus is deep integration with reactive streams and machine learning:

Reactive AI Pipeline — built-in support for Deep Java Library (DJL) and TensorFlow Java libraries for creating machine learning endpoints.
Virtual Threads by Default — the entire Spring ecosystem (WebFlux, Data, Security) transitions to virtual threads, simplifying concurrent code writing.
Native Support for GraalVM — the Spring Native utility is replaced by a built-in AOT compiler that reduces application startup time to 50 ms.

GraalVM 25: Super-Compilation and Polyglot Capabilities

Oracle Labs announced GraalVM 25, which received a "Super-Compilation" mode. Key features:

Automatic Native Image — the compiler automatically identifies entry points and creates native executable files without manual configuration.
Polyglot 2.0 — a unified API for calling code in Python, JavaScript, Ruby, and R from Java applications with zero data transfer overhead.
Memory Footprint Reduction — memory consumption reduced by up to 60% compared to JVM HotSpot.

Developer Tools: IntelliJ IDEA 2025 and JUnit 6

JetBrains showcased IntelliJ IDEA 2025 with the AI assistant JetBrains AI Pro, which not only completes code but also automatically generates tests and documentation. The JUnit community presented JUnit 6 with support for annotation-based parameterized tests and integration with virtual threads.