This interview was recorded for GOTO State of the Art in March 2026. #GOTOcon #GOTO
https://gotopia.tech

Ben Evans - Senior Principal Software Engineer at Red Hat & Co-Author of "Optimizing Cloud Native Java" and many more Books

Read the full transcription of this interview here:
https://gotopia.tech/articles/439

RESOURCES
Ben
https://mastodon.social/@kittylyst
https://bsky.app/profile/ogkittylyst.bsky.social
https://github.com/kittylyst
https://twitter.com/kittylyst
https://www.linkedin.com/in/kittylyst
https://www.kittylyst.com

Links
https://newrelic.com/resources/report/2024-state-of-the-java-ecosystem
https://redmonk.com/sogrady/2025/06/18/language-rankings-1-25
https://www.stepsecurity.io/blog/hackerbot-claw-github-actions-exploitation
https://stripe.dev/blog/minions-stripes-one-shot-end-to-end-coding-agents
https://openjdk.org/jeps/8305968
https://openjdk.org/jeps/353
https://openjdk.org/jeps/416
https://developer.ibm.com/articles/j-ffm
https://openjdk.org/jeps/8350458
https://openjdk.org/jeps/8303099

DESCRIPTION
In this GOTO State of the Art episode, Java Champion and Red Hat Senior Principal Software Engineer Ben Evans delivers a sweeping, data-driven audit of Java's health in 2026 — and the picture is far healthier than the tech press would have you believe. Server-side Java workloads have roughly doubled in the last seven years, developer wages are stable (unlike JavaScript, which is heading south), Java has been in the top four programming languages for twelve consecutive years, and the entire cloud-native infrastructure stack — Kafka, Cassandra, Spark, OpenTelemetry, Keycloak — runs on it. The real insight is mathematical: explosive growth of a small language base is still dwarfed by modest growth of Java's enormous installed base. Java isn't dying; it's just not shiny enough to get clicks.

The meat of the talk is a masterclass in Java's architecture and roadmap. Ben unpacks the fundamental tension between dynamism (the JVM's Lisp-and-Smalltalk-heritage runtime) and integrity (modern security demands that restrict unchecked internal API access), before walking through the near and far future: Project Valhalla's value types (the most fundamental change to Java ever — bigger than generics or lambdas), the Vector API waiting on Valhalla to land, nullability markers, ahead-of-time compilation, and beyond that, type classes and Project Babylon.

His honest take on AI tooling is sharp: great for greenfield, genuinely poor at architectural reasoning and version-specific code, and only a real productivity multiplier for teams who already have solid engineering practices. Oh, and it's a wolf in sheep's clothing — the JVM's dynamism makes it way closer to Lisp than to C++, and Java's philosophy of "boring done right" turns out to be an excellent foundation for AI-era enterprise software.

TIMECODES
00:00 Intro
00:35 Agenda
02:26 Current status
20:22 Java's philosophy & evolution
25:20 Dynamism
30:32 Integrity
33:52 Near future
38:53 Frontiers
40:03 Outro

RECOMMENDED BOOKS
Ben Evans & Jim Gough • Optimizing Cloud Native Java • https://amzn.to/41nivD9
Ben Evans, Jason Clark & David Flanagan • Java in a Nutshell • https://amzn.to/43FDoMA
Ben Evans, Martijn Verburg & Jason Clark • The Well-Grounded Java Developer • https://amzn.to/41JMG7N
Ben Evans, Jim Gough & Chris Newland • Optimizing Java • https://amzn.to/4bNOfGh
Ben Evans & Martijn Verburg • The Well-Grounded Java Developer • https://amzn.to/4hs9MWk

https://bsky.app/profile/gotocon.com
https://twitter.com/GOTOcon
https://www.linkedin.com/company/goto-
https://www.instagram.com/goto_con
https://www.facebook.com/GOTOConferences
#Java #Java25 #PerformanceEngineering #JVM #JavaProgramming #JavaPerformance #JavaConcurrency #Dynamism #CloudNativeJava #Quarkus #ProjectValhalla #ProjectBabylon #SoftwareEngineering #Programming #TodayInTech #BenEvans #Kittylyst

CHANNEL MEMBERSHIP BONUS
Join this channel to get early access to videos & other perks:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCs_tLP3AiwYKwdUHpltJPuA/join

Looking for a unique learning experience?
Attend the next GOTO conference near you! Get your ticket at https://gotopia.tech
Sign up for updates and specials at https://gotopia.tech/newsletter

SUBSCRIBE TO OUR CHANNEL - new videos posted almost daily.
https://www.youtube.com/user/GotoConferences/?sub_confirmation=1

GOTO's resource offers insights, tutorials, and resources for software developers, architects, and technology leaders. Readers can learn about emerging technologies, industry trends, and best practices for software development. With articles, talks, and workshops, GOTO provides  guidance and expertise for staying ahead in the ever-evolving world of technology.

GOTO Conferences

Ben Evans (IBM/Red Hat) presents a comprehensive state-of-Java-in-2026 overview covering ecosystem health, language evolution, and future roadmap. Key data points: server-side Java workloads have roughly doubled in 7 years, Java wages remain stable, and Java holds a top-4 language position consistently. The talk covers Java's philosophy of backwards compatibility and steady modernization, the tension between dynamism (reflection, bytecode weaving, Java agents) and integrity (removing internal API access, restricting unsafe operations). Modern additions highlighted include virtual threads with structured concurrency, records, sealed classes, and pattern matching. AI integration is discussed via LangChain4j, Spring AI, and Quarkus, with honest caveats about LLM limitations on large codebases and version-specific knowledge. Future roadmap items include Project Valhalla (value types — described as the most fundamental JVM change ever), the Vector API for AI workloads, nullability markers, ahead-of-time compilation via condensers, and frontier research on type classes and Project Babylon.

State of the Art of Java in 2026 • Ben Evans • GOTO 2026