Key Findings from New Relic's 2023 State of the Java Ecosystem Report

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New Relic recently released the "2023 State of the Java Ecosystem" report, providing insights into the current status of Java based on performance data from millions of applications.

Java 17 adoption grew 430% in one year

Java 11 remains the most popular LTS version, used by over 56% of production applications, up from 48% in 2022. Java 8 follows with about 33% usage, down from 46% in 2022. Java 17, released in September 2021, now powers more than 9% of applications, representing a 430% increase from the previous year.

Legacy Java 7 usage is near zero

Support for Java 7 ended in 2022, and only 0.28% of applications still run it, mostly legacy systems.

Non‑LTS versions see low adoption

Only 1.6% of applications use non‑LTS Java releases, down from 2.7% in 2022. Java 14, released in January 2020, is the most popular non‑LTS version at 0.57% usage, followed by Java 15 at 0.44%.

Factors reducing non‑LTS usage

Lack of long‑term support

Perceived feature attractiveness

Time until the next LTS release

Amazon becomes the most popular JDK vendor

Oracle dominated the market in 2020 with about 75% share, but its share fell to 34% in 2022 and 28% in 2023 due to restrictive licensing on Java 11. Amazon Corretto’s share rose to 31%, making it the leading JDK provider.

Containerized applications are mainstream

Approximately 70% of Java applications reported to New Relic run inside containers.

Garbage collector preferences

The Garbage‑First (G1) collector remains the favorite for Java 11 and newer users, with a 65% adoption rate. Experimental collectors such as ZGC and Shenandoah see minimal use despite being production‑ready.

For more details, see the full report at https://newrelic.com/resources/report/2023-state-of-the-java-ecosystem.