Boost Maven Builds 3× Faster with mvnd: What It Is and How to Use It

What is mvnd

mvnd is an Apache Maven subproject (maven-mvnd) that serves as an extension rather than a completely new build tool.

It is built on Gradle and Takari with the goal of making Maven builds faster.

Gradle is a project automation tool based on Apache Ant and Maven concepts, using Groovy or Kotlin DSL instead of traditional XML.

Takari is the core of the Maven wrapper, allowing projects to build without a pre‑installed Maven.

Performance Improvement

Based on a multi‑module Maven project (pig), the author observed a 300% performance boost when using mvnd.

<code>芯片：Apple M1
核总数：8（4性能和4效率）
内存：16 GB
</code>

<code>mvnd clean install

[INFO] ------------------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] BUILD SUCCESS
[INFO] ------------------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] Total time:  16.334 s (Wall Clock)
[INFO] Finished at: 2021-12-24T09:08:57+08:00
[INFO] ------------------------------------------------------------------------
</code>

<code>mvn clean install

[INFO] ------------------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] BUILD SUCCESS
[INFO] ------------------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] Total time:  43.119 s
[INFO] Finished at: 2021-12-24T08:41:10+08:00
[INFO] ------------------------------------------------------------------------
</code>

How to Use

Download and unzip the release from GitHub .

Configure the

mvnd

environment variable.

These two steps complete the mvnd installation; it includes a built‑in Maven, so no separate Maven download is required.

Migrating Maven Configuration

Edit

conf/mvnd.properties

to point to your existing Maven settings.

Set

maven.settings

to the location of your original

settings.xml

file.

<code>#
# The location of the maven settings file. The client normally uses default settings in {@code ~/.m2/settings.xml}.

maven.settings=/Users/lengleng/env/apache-maven-3.8.1/conf/settings.xml
</code>

References

https://github.com/apache/maven-mvnd