How to Package a Spring Boot Application into an EXE Installer Using exe4j and Inno Setup

The author needed to turn a Spring Boot JAR into a standalone executable for non‑technical users and documents the entire process.

Preparation: Obtain a working JAR, download exe4j (link: https://pan.baidu.com/s/1hpfhYNWXbojq1F82Pp7KTQ, extraction code: 6hzf, registration code: L-g782dn2d-1f1yqxx1rv1sqd) and Inno Setup (link: https://pan.baidu.com/s/1AjuG2jbIVroLcNR4y8Rtug, extraction code: nnzd).

Using exe4j: Open exe4j, select “Java to EXE”, set the application name and output path, choose the launch mode, enable 32‑ and 64‑bit compatibility, add the VM parameter -Dfile.encoding=utf-8, configure the embedded JRE (point to a local JRE folder), select Client VM, and complete the wizard to generate demo.exe.

Using Inno Setup: Create a new script (File → New), fill in basic application information, add the generated demo.exe, specify the output directory, and embed the local JRE files with the line

Source: "自己本地JRE路径\*"; DestDir: "{app}\{#MyJreName}"; Flags: ignoreversion recursesubdirs createallsubdirs

. Compile the script to produce setup.exe.

Result: The resulting setup.exe installs the application together with the bundled JRE, allowing it to run on machines without a JDK; the installer can be shared with other users.