Java is a widely used programming language. Java is a simple and robust language used to develop mobile applications, desktop applications, web applications, games, etc. There are many excellent Java books available for programmers. Whether you’re a beginner programmer or an experienced professional, there’s a Java book out there that can help you learn and improve your skills.
If you’re new to Java programming, we recommend checking out “Java: A Beginner’s Guide” by Herbert Schildt. For a more in-depth look at Java, we recommend “Effective Java” by Joshua Bloch.
In this article, we’ve compiled a list of the best Java books for both beginners and advanced programmers. We have done an unbiased review of them as well as added links to the Amazon website to directly purchase them. If permissible, you can also download the free PDF books on Java below.
Best Java Books for Beginners and Advanced Programmers
- Best Java Books for Beginners:
- Java Programming Books for Beginners
- Java: The Complete Reference
- Head First Java
- Core Java: An Integrated Approach
- Beginning Programming with Java For Dummies
- Programming in Java
- Core Java for Beginners
- Thinking In Java
- Best Java Books for Intermediates
- Java Books for Intermediates
- Effective Java
- Programming with Java
- Core Java for the Impatient
- Java Concurrency in Practice
- Best Java Books for Experts/Advanced Programmers:
- Top 10 Advanced Java Books
- Advanced Java Programming
- Advance Java Technology
- Java Programming Advance Topics
- Schaum’s Outline of Programming with Java
- Java 8 in Action
- Java Data Structures & Algorithms Books:
- Core Java Books:
- Object Oriented Programming in JAVA Books:
- Java and J2EE Books:
- Enterprise Java Books:
- Books to Crack Java Programming Interviews:
- Java Programming Interviews Exposed (WROX)
- Cracking the C, C++ and Java Interview
- JAVA J2EE Interview Questions
- Frequently Asked Questions on Java Books
If you’re just getting started with Java, we recommend “Java: A Beginner’s Guide” by Herbert Schildt This book will teach you the basics of programming in Java, including how to create, compile, and run programs. “Head First Java” by Kathy Sierra is another excellent Java Book for Beginners because it teaches the fundamentals of programming and syntax using simple language and examples. Here is the recommended list of best Java books for beginners. We would recommend these books to all newbies who want to learn Java and want to develop their career as Java programmers.
Best Java Books for Experts/Advanced Programmers
| 2."Advance Java" by Gajendra Gupta
“Advance Java” Book Review: The book provides information about the components required to form the Java technology. It discusses the inventory management system project in detail. The book describes that Java has changed from a programming language to a robust and machine independent server-side technology. It contains details of JDBC, SQL, XML, XSL and JavaBeans.
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| 3."Advance Java Programming" by Kanika Lakhani | |
| 6."Advance Java Programming" by Harry Hariom Choudhary and James J Tam
“Advance Java Programming” Book Review: The book provides various developments and techniques in java programming. The book contains knowledge of streams, networking database programming facilities, JNDI/LDAP directory integration and internationalisation. It discusses advanced swing techniques, JavaBeans components, web services and platform security features.
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| 7."Java: The Complete Reference, Seventh Edition" by Herbert Schildt
“Java: The Complete Reference, Seventh Edition” Book Review: This book is useful for undergraduate and graduate students and also for professional software engineers. Computer science researchers and PhD students can also use this book. Professors can also use this book to teach students and examine the java concepts. This book gives the best approach to learn java by giving out all the topics step by step. It consists of many chapters which gives programming in java for better understanding. It starts with explaining dynamic allocation of memory by JVM and files. It also explains the basic loops and the data types. It explains arrays and other data structures like linked lists, trees, queues and stacks. This book also explains the OOPS concepts like inheritance, polymorphism, abstraction and encapsulation. Later on it teaches how to handle exceptions and explains various classes and modules along with APIs. It also explains threading. The book is especially beneficial for Java programmers. It explains the concept of enumeration, autoboxing, annotations and multithreading. The book provides information about Applets and Servlets, Swing, JavaBeans and AWT. The book discusses the I/O classes. It also contains the principles of Java programming.
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| 11."The Java Programming Language" by Arnold
“The Java Programming Language” Book Review: This book explains Java Programming in in-depth. It contains collections and internationalization packages. It has many examples to understand the programming perfectly. The book will be beneficial for both beginners and advanced learners. This book elaborately explains all concepts of java along with suitable examples. Topics like generics, enums, and annotations are included in this book. Other chapters like autoboxing, variable argument methods and assertion and regular expression are also included in this book. This book also covers the essential java libraries. Examples are included throughout the book for better understanding.
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Java Programming, Data Structures & Algorithms
| 1."Data Structures and Algorithms in Java" by Michael T Goodrich | |
| 2."Java Puzzlers" by Joshua Bloch & Neal Gafter
“Java Puzzlers” Book Review: This book is written for computer science students and people interested in learning Java. This book dives deep into the subtleties of the java language and its core libraries. This book contains 95 diabolical puzzles. The puzzles are in the form of a short program that doesn’t work the way it is supposed to. Each puzzle has a well explained solution. These solutions also help the reader avoid the underlying traps and pitfalls. A chapter explaining the common traps and pitfalls is also included at the back of the book.
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| 3."Java Generics and Collections" by Naftalin and Philip Wadler
“Java Generics and Collections” Book Review: This book is written for computer science students and people interested in learning Java. This book contains elaborate explanations on the java libraries. This book covers everything from the most basic use of generics to the strangest corner cases. All the information about the collection libraries is included in this book.
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| 4."Object-Oriented Data Structures Using Java" by Nell Dale | |
| 5."Data Structures & Algorithms in Java" by Robert Lafore | |
| 6."Open Data Structures" by Pat Morin
“Open Data Structures” Book Review: This book is written for computer science students and people interested in data structures. This book is an introductory course to the subject and covers the implementation and analysis of data structures. Topics like sequences (lists), queues and priority queues are elaborately explained in this book. Other topics like unordered dictionaries, ordered dictionaries, and graphs are also addressed in this book. This book also contains problems that come with instructions and source code for better understanding.
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Core Java
| 1."Core and Advanced Java, Black Book, Recommended by CDAC" by Dreamtech Press
“Core and Advanced Java, Black Book, Recommended by CDAC” Book Review: The book covers all the major and advanced concepts of Java in a well defined format. The book helps to learn the concepts from OOPS to abstract classes and interfaces followed by software packaging to providing API documents; from error handling to converting fundamental data into object form; from collection framework to streams and creating client and server programs to threads. Moreover,the book also gives knowledge from creating GUI applications to generics and communication with databases. The book incorporates various JAVA related technologies such as JDBC 4.0, Servlets 3.1, JSP 2.3, Expression language 3.0, JSTL 1.2, Hibernate, Struts 2 along with Spring 3.0.
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| 2."Core Java Programming-A Practical Approach" by Tushar B Kute
“Core Java Programming-A Practical Approach” Book Review: The book is designed for the students who want to learn Java Programming from the beginning. The book covers a major part of the syllabus designed by Maharashtra State Board of Technical Education for Java Programming. Each topic is illustrated with 144 solved programming examples. The comprehensive textbook covers topics like Packages, Interfaces and Streams with detailed descriptions.The book is also provided with multiple objective questions and programming exercises. Practical Implementation of all the topics on Core Java Programming are covered in the book.
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| 3."Core Java: A Comprehensive Study" by Matha Mahesh P
“Core Java: A Comprehensive Study” Book Review: The book is designed for undergraduate students of B.Tech in Computer Science and I.T as well as BCA/MCA. The comprehensive textbook talks about major aspects of Core Java in a simple and easy language. The book begins with the fundamentals of Java and further it gives description of the various operators provided by Java. The book also tells us the different ways of making decisions through branching, and the core concepts of Java, that is, classes, objects and their features. The book also contains intricacies of one of the most important features of object-orientation which include Inheritance, Intricacies and further book elaborates on the classes and interfaces of lang, util and io packages.
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| 4."Java: Core Concepts and Applications" by Trilochan Tarai
“Java: Core Concepts and Applications” Book Review: The textbook provides a comprehensive study material of the core concepts of Java Programming with real life examples. Various Contents are explored in the book like Serialization, Marker Interface, Externalization, Collection Framework and Multithreading. The book also covers major parts of Internet Programming, Benefits of executing Java Programs, Ways of Increasing User Performance, Security features and Enhancements. The book entails various topics like Collection Framework, Annotation, Implementation and Algorithms,Enhanced for loop and Serialization and Deserialization. Every chapter ends with Debugging exercises in the book.
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Object Oriented Programming in JAVA
| 1."Object Oriented Programming in Java" by G T Thampi | |
| 2."Introduction to Programming with Greenfoot: Object-Oriented Programming in Java with Games and Simulations" by Michael Kolling
“Introduction to Programming with Greenfoot: Object-Oriented Programming in Java with Games and Simulations” Book Review: This book provides the fundamentals of Java computer programming languages in the context of Greenfoot. It presents the general fundamentals and principles of programming. These are provided by creating their very own fun and interesting games and simulations. The main topics are provided in modern, object-oriented programming language in this book. They are provided through hands-on, practical activity that allows us to create, observe, and play. It covers the important topics like getting to know greenfoot, the first program: little crab. It also includes improving the crab’s more sophisticated programming, finishing the crab game.
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| 3."jQuery For Beginners: Your Guide To Easily Learn jQuery Programming in 7 days" by iCode Academy and jQuery Programming
“jQuery For Beginners: Your Guide To Easily Learn jQuery Programming in 7 days” Book Review: This book provides steps and strategies on how to create programs using jQuery. It presents the fundamentals of the programming language. This book includes the things you have to do in order to come up with working programs. It describes jQuery, the reason to choose it over other programming languages. This book consists of sample codes to help you gain a better understanding of the concepts of jQuery. This book acts as a reference guide for web developers.
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| 4."Modular Programming in Java 9" by Koushik Kothagal
“Modular Programming in Java 9” Book Review: This book will give you detailed instructions to create new modules. It also helps to migrate code from earlier versions of Java to the Java 9 module system. This book provides all the information about java modules. It presents the information on how to create module definitions, set up inter-module dependencies. This book explains the built-in modules from the modular JDK. It also presents about module resolution and how to use j link to generate custom runtime images.
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| 5."Functional Programming in Java" by Venkat Subramaniam
“Functional Programming in Java” Book Review: This book provides popular design patterns. These patterns include decorator, builder, and strategy, come to life to solve common design problems. This problem solving requires a little ceremony and effort. This text helps us pick up techniques to implement designs. These techniques and designs were beyond easy reach in earlier versions of Java. It includes tail call optimization, memoization, and effortless parallelization techniques.
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| 6."Programming Finite Elements in Java™" by Gennadiy P Nikishkov
“Programming Finite Elements in Java™” Book Review: This book provides the information on how to programme the algorithms. These algorithms of the finite element method (FEM) in Java™. It presents the compact, simple code. This helps the student to read the algorithms. It helps to understand and thus to be able to refine them. This book covers all the aspects of finite element techniques. It considers finite element solution, generation of finite element meshes and visualization of finite element models and results with Java 3D™.
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| 7."Object-Oriented Programming in JAVA" by Danny Poo
“Object-Oriented Programming in JAVA” Book Review: This book lets us learn object-oriented programming in Java. It serves the readers with basic knowledge of Java programming. This book presumes and guides readers in every step of the object-oriented programming process. It provides complete source code in every example and where applicable. This book includes the screen-shots showing the development of application programs. It covers various topics like object, class, single class inheritance, encapsulation, polymorphism, abstract class, abstract method, etc.
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| 8."Object-Oriented Programming in Java" by Er Ashish Sharma | |
| 9."Interactive Object Oriented Programming in Java: Learn and Test Your Skills" by Vaskaran Sarcar
“Interactive Object Oriented Programming in Java: Learn and Test Your Skills” Book Review: This book presents its material in a dialogue with the reader. It uses Java and Eclipse to write and generate output for examples. These are written in the topics like classes, interfaces, overloading, and overriding.This book acts as a guide for software developers and software testers. It covers Java programming concepts. These concepts include abstract classes, packages, and exception handling.
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| 10."Object-Oriented Programming featuring Graphical Applications in Java" by Michael J Laszlo | |
Java and J2EE
| 1."J2EE: The complete Reference" by Jim Keogh
“J2EE: The complete Reference” Book Review: This book is comprehensive and easy to understand and work with J2EE. The book is for beginners as well as professionals of programming. It contains J2EE architecture, it’s database and web services. It also provides knowledge of assimilating and taking advantage of J2EE!’s security features. It assures a time tested record of accuracy, comprehension and authenticity.
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| 2."JAVA/J2EE: Interview Questions (With Set of 2 CDs)" by Shivprasad Koirala
“Java/J2EE Job Interview Companion” Book Review: The book contains various answers based on interview questions. It focuses on providing core concepts to aspiring job seekers. It is like a guide manual for interview preparation. It consists of various examples, illustrations and diagrams for ease-of-learning.
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| 3."Java/J2EE Job Interview Companion" by Arulkumaran Kumaraswamipillai
“Java / J2EE: Interview Questions You’ll Most Likely be Asked: Volume 10 (Job Interview Questions Series)” Book Review: This book is a guide to job seekers. It consists of only information required for job search to build an IT career. It develops a feeling of real-time interview to an interviewee. It includes various questions and answers for better understanding. It also contains plenty of examples, aptitude tests and HR questionnaires.
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| 4."Java Server Programming Java EE 7 (J2EE 1.7), Black Book" by Kogent Learning Solutions Inc | |
| 5."Java / J2EE: Interview Questions You'll Most Likely be Asked: Volume 10 (Job Interview Questions Series)" by Vibrant Publishers | |
| 6."Interview Questions with Java/J2EE" by A Goyal
“Interview Questions with Java/J2EE” Book Review: The book is designed for pre-interview preparations. It includes in total six hundreds of questions. It focuses on various aspects like motivation, leadership, egoless programming and stress.
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| 7."C, C++, Java and J2EE Interview Questions (with Ready Answers)" by R N Satpathy and Bimal Kumar Sahoo
“C, C++, Java and J2EE Interview Questions (with Ready Answers)” Book Review: The book is designed to be an interview book for students and also professionals. It is for those who are getting ready for an interview for a job on JAVA platforms. The book consists of various related topics like C, C++, core java and adverse java.
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| 8."JAVA J2EE Interview Question" by S Jaiswal
“JAVA J2EE Interview Question” Book Review: The book contains basics of java programming and core java programming events.
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| 9."Java / J2EE Design Patterns Interview Questions You'll Most Likely be Asked (Job Interview Questions)" by Virbrant Publishers
“Java / J2EE Design Patterns Interview Questions You’ll Most Likely be Asked (Job Interview Questions)” Book Review: This book is a guide to job seekers. It consists of only information required for job search to build an IT career. It develops a feeling of real-time interview to an interviewee. It includes various questions and answers for better understanding. It also contains plenty of examples, aptitude tests and HR questionnaires.
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| 10."Professional Java Server Programming: J2EE 1.3ed" by Subrahmanyam Allamaraju and Cedric Buest
“Professional Java Server Programming: J2EE 1.3ed” Book Review: The book is suitable for java programmers. This book revolves around the concepts of java programming. It contains realistic information and suggestions for using java tools. It also contains fundamental concepts of network and web programming. It also teaches to design and build secure n-tier J2EE applications using JSP.
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| 11."Practical DWR 2 Projects (Expert's Voice in Java)" by Frank Zammetti
“Practical DWR 2 Projects (Expert’s Voice in Java)” Book Review: This book is basically for web developers. It provides various projects for enhancing the understanding of the subject. It includes a lot of examples and illustrations for better understanding.
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Enterprise Java
| 1."OCM Java EE 6 Enterprise Architect Exam Guide" by Allen P R
“OCM Java EE 6 Enterprise Architect Exam Guide” Book Review: This book is useful for undergraduate and graduate students and also for professional software engineers. Computer science researchers and PhD students can also use this book. Professors can also use this book to teach students and examine the java concepts. This book explains java concepts and the architecture behind it. It starts with explaining application design concepts and principles. Common architectures Integration and messaging are explained later on. Business tier technologies are also explained. Web-tier technologies, design patterns and security are discussed at the end. This book also provides MCQs for each chapter.
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| 2."Java Enterprise Edition: A Practical Approach" by B Mohamed Ibrahim
“Java Enterprise Edition: A Practical Approach” Book Review: This book is useful for undergraduate and graduate students and also for professional software engineers. Computer science researchers and PhD students can also use this book. This book gives a practical approach in learning the java core concepts. It teaches APIs to be brief. Important APIs of JEE components are listed with explanation. One complete chapter is given to explain the oracle database. This book gives examples, especially in explaining JDBC concepts. It also explains applets, graphic making concepts, frameworks and AWT at the end. It consists of various chapters and also interviews important concepts. It also explains advancement in technologies using the JDBC concepts.
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| 3."Sun Certified Enterprise Architect for Java EE Study Guide(Second edition)" by Cade
“Sun Certified Enterprise Architect for Java EE Study Guide(Second edition)” Book Review: This book is useful for undergraduate and graduate students and also for professional software engineers. Computer science researchers and PhD students can also use this book. This book gives a practical approach in learning the java core concepts. This book is for sun certified enterprise architect (SCEA) for Java EE certification. This book discusses all the core concepts to get the knowledge about the Java EE examination. It explains concepts like CDI events. This book also explains portable security API. Later, bean validation is explained. It discusses Java persistence and its API socket. It also explains java RESTful web services along with the Servlet 4.0. It finally ends with explaining Javamail.
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| 4."Mastering Enterprises Java Beans 3.0" by Rima Patel Sriganesh and Gerald Brose
“Mastering Enterprises JavaBeans 3.0” Book Review: This book is designed for MCA/ B.Tech/ M.Tech students and also for Phd students who are under computer science and departments. Teachers teaching this portion can also use this book to guide students. This book covers the detailed information about the new EJB 3.0 specification. This book has 4 major chapters in it. It also attaches an appendix. This book also explains about serialization in java. This book also explains properties like getter and setter and their usage. It also related javabeans to encapsulation. This book also describes adavatanafes and disadvantages of javabeans. It also describes in depth framework for java beans along with its architecture.
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| 5."Professional Java for Web Applications: Featuring WebSockets, Spring Framework, JPA Hibernate and Spring Security (WROX)" by Nicholas S Williams
“Professional Java for Web Applications: Featuring WebSockets, Spring Framework, JPA Hibernate and Spring Security (WROX)” Book Review: Professionals can make use of this book. Software industry experienced employees can use this book to develop the software in their respective domains. This book explains the basic web application. It starts with explaining web sockets in java and their corresponding codes. It also explains the spring framework which is most important in continuous online software. This book also explains hibernate options and their concepts. It explains web applications and their coding part. WROX is also given a detailed description in this book. Applets and servlets are also added.
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| 6."OCP Java SE 6 Programmer Practice Exams (Exam 310-065) (Certification Press)" by Bert Bates and Kathy Sierra
“OCP Java SE 6 Programmer Practice Exams (Exam 310-065) (Certification Press)” Book Review: This book is useful for undergraduate and graduate students and also for professional software engineers. Computer science researchers and PhD students can also use this book. Professors can also use this book to teach students and examine the java concepts. This book gives the best approach to learn java by giving out all the topics step by step. It starts with explaining the declarations and access control. Object orientation assignments are explained later. It also explains operators flow control and exceptions. Assertions strings and I/o formatting are explained later. Parsing generics and collections , inner classes are explained. Threads development and other core concepts are explained at the end. It also contains important java software engineering questions and interviews questions.
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| 7."Building Java Enterprise Applications – V 1 Architecture" by Brett Mclaughlin
“Building Java Enterprise Applications – V 1 Architecture” Book Review: This book has been made for M.Tech students who are interested in learning the architecture of java. Professionals can make use of this book. Software industry experienced employees can use this book to develop the software in their respective domains.This book gives detailed examination of the APIs. Concepts like Entity Beans, JDBC and JMS and JNDI are explained in the book. This book explains all the core concepts to get the knowledge about the java EE enterprises. It explains concepts like CDI events. This book also explains portable security API. Later, bean validation is explained. It discusses java persistence and its API socket. It also explains java RESTful web services along with the Servlet 4.0. It finally ends with explaining Javamail.
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| 8."Java Masterclass: Java Exceptions, Assertions and Logging" by Sam Alapati
“Java Masterclass: Java Exceptions, Assertions and Logging” Book Review: This book is aimed at newcomers to the world of exceptions, assertions and logging. The reader will learn about the different types of exception, and how to deal with them elegantly. He/She will also be able to dig deep into exception Objects and learn how to define custom exceptions. One can also discover practical guidelines on the effective use of exceptions, including when to chain exceptions. The reader will be able to check his application code, using simple pass/fail Assertion tests. Topics covered are java.util.logging, Log4J, and other logging frameworks. Lots of sample code, hints, tips and notes, etc help in better understanding.
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Frequently Asked Questions on Java Books
1. Which is the best Java book for beginners?
“Java: A Beginner’s Guide” by Herbert Schildt is the best book for beginners. This book will teach you the fundamentals of Java programming, including how to write, compile, and run programs. “Head First Java” by Kathy Sierra is another excellent Java Book for Beginners because it teaches the fundamentals of programming and syntax through simple language and examples.
2. Which Java Programming book is the best?
If you are looking for a free Java book, there are many options available. Here is a list of some of the best free Java books:
- “Java: A Beginner’s Guide” by Herbert Schildt: This book will teach you the basics of Java programming, such as how to write, compile, and run programs.
- “Head First Java” by Kathy Sierra: If you’re new to programming or just to Java, this book is a great place to start. It teaches the fundamentals of programming and Java syntax through simple language and examples.
- “Effective Java” by Joshua Bloch: This book is full of useful advice on how to write clean, concise, and effective code in Java.
- “Java 8 in Action” by Mario Fusco and Raoul-Gabriel Urma: This book is written with the new features of Java 8. The book covers lambdas, streams, and functional-style programming.
- “Java Concurrency in Practice” by Goetz: As more applications are written for multi-core processors, it is critical to understand concurrent programming in Java.
3. Is Java still popular?
Java is a popular programming language that powers millions of devices and applications around the world. Developers use it to create everything from desktop apps to server-side code to Android apps, and more.
If you are new to coding, Java is a great language to learn. It’s relatively simple compared to other languages, but it’s still very powerful. And because it is so popular, there are many resources available to help you learn Java. So, if you are wondering if Java is worth learning, the answer is definitely yes!.
4. Can I learn Java in 2 days?
No, you cannot learn Java in two days. However, you can learn the basics of the Java language in that time frame. After that, it will take some practise and ongoing learning to become proficient in Java.
5. Is Java easy to study?
Java is not difficult to learn, but it’s not easy either. It’s a powerful language that takes some time to master. But once you do, you can build amazing things.
6. Which is the best Java book for advanced/experienced programmers?
Effective Java by Joshua Bloch is the best Java book for advanced programmers. This book covers best practises for writing maintainable and efficient Java code. Another good option for experts is Java 8 in Action by Mario Fusco and Raoul-Gabriel Urma.
Java Programming Resources:
- Java MCQ
- Java Online Tests
- Java Programs
- Java Algorithms
- Java Certification Contest
- Java Internship
- Computer Science Books
We have created a collection of the Top books to learn Java. Thus, one can easily view the list of best books on “Java” and purchase books online or offline.
If any more book needs to be added to the list of best books on Java subject, please let us know.
We have put a lot of effort into researching the best books on Java and came out with a recommended list and their reviews. If any more book needs to be added to this list, please email us. We are working on free pdf downloads for books on Java and will publish the download link here. Fill out this Java books pdf download" request form for download notification.
