What’s New in Spring Framework 7? Features, Removals, and Migration Tips

1. Introduction

Spring Framework 7 arrives with many long‑awaited features and carefully crafted improvements that modernise the framework while reducing boilerplate in everyday development.

2. New Features

2.1 Baseline Upgrade

The new baseline retains JDK 17 and recommends JDK 25 as the latest LTS version. It also adopts Jakarta EE 11, Kotlin 2.2 and GraalVM 25.

Servlet 6.1 (Tomcat 11.0, Jetty 12.1)

JPA 3.2 (Hibernate ORM 7.1/7.2)

Bean Validation 3.1 (Hibernate Validator 9.0/9.1)

GraalVM 25 with the new “precise reachability metadata” format

Netty 4.2 (see #34996)

Kotlin 2.2 (see #33629)

JUnit 6

2.2 Removed APIs

Removal of spring-jcl in favour of Apache Commons Logging 1.3.0.

Removal of support for javax.annotation and javax.inject annotations; migrate to jakarta.annotation and jakarta.inject.

Removal of several path‑mapping options such as suffixPatternMatch, trailingSlashMatch, and related content‑negotiation flags.

Removal of Undertow support because Undertow does not yet support Servlet 6.1.

Other removals include ListenableFuture (replaced by CompletableFuture), WebJars‑locator‑core, OkHttp3 support, and various internal APIs (see issue numbers in the original text).

2.3 Major Changes

The SpringExtension now scopes the ExtensionContext to the test method, enabling consistent dependency‑injection semantics for @Nested test classes. Custom TestExecutionListener implementations may need to use testContext.getTestInstance().getClass() instead of testContext.getTestClass().

Deprecated items include RestTemplate (will be officially deprecated in 7.1) and the <mvc:*> XML namespace (still usable but no longer updated).

2.4 Powerful New Additions

Full‑stack null‑safety using JSpecify annotations, replacing the older JSR‑305 approach.

Support for Java 24+ class‑file APIs via a new ClassFileMetadataReader in spring‑core.

Programmatic bean registration through the BeanRegistrar contract.

Enhanced SpEL support for java.util.Optional and Elvis operator handling.

Global proxy type default switched to CGLIB with opt‑out via the @Proxyable annotation.

Resilient retry support merged into org.springframework.core.retry with RetryTemplate, @Retryable and @ConcurrencyLimit.

New HTTP client configuration via @ImportHttpServices and a dedicated RestTestClient for non‑reactive testing.

PathPattern matching now uses the new matcher; the old AntPathMatcher is deprecated.

3. Sample Configurations

@Configuration(proxyBeanMethods = false)
@ImportHttpServices(group = "weather", types = {FreeWeather.class, CommercialWeather.class})
@ImportHttpServices(group = "user", types = {UserServiceInternal.class, UserServiceOfficial.class})
static class HttpServicesConfiguration extends AbstractHttpServiceRegistrar {
    @Bean
    public RestClientHttpServiceGroupConfigurer groupConfigurer() {
        return groups -> groups.filterByName("weather", "user")
            .configureClient((group, builder) -> builder.defaultHeader("User-Agent", "My-Application"));
    }
}

@Configuration
public class WebConfiguration implements WebMvcConfigurer {
    @Override
    public void configureMessageConverters(HttpMessageConverters.ServerBuilder builder) {
        JsonMapper jsonMapper = JsonMapper.builder()
            .findAndAddModules()
            .enable(SerializationFeature.INDENT_OUTPUT)
            .defaultDateFormat(new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd"))
            .build();
        builder.jsonMessageConverter(new JacksonJsonHttpMessageConverter(jsonMapper));
    }
}

4. Conclusion

Spring Framework 7 modernises the stack, raises baseline requirements, removes outdated APIs, deprecates legacy features, and introduces a suite of powerful new capabilities that simplify bean registration, improve null‑safety, enhance HTTP client handling, and provide a more consistent testing experience. Migrating applications should review the removed APIs, update deprecated annotations, and consider the new configuration options to fully benefit from the upgrade.