That’s a short, practical overview of what’s in #Java26. If you want a deeper dive or prefer a video format, @cat-edelveis.bsky.social walks through all the JEPs in detail in a new video. Watch it here: youtu.be/wtTdWkosCIc

🧹 JEP 504 – Remove the Applet API.
The long-deprecated Applet API (java.applet, javax.swing.JApplet, and related pieces) is finally removed, closing a chapter that has been obsolete since browsers dropped support years ago.

🧮 JEP 529 – Vector API (11th incubator).
The Vector API continues to incubate, providing a portable way to express SIMD-style computations that HotSpot can map to optimal vector instructions where available, while longer-term progress depends on Valhalla-related work.

🔐 JEP 524 – PEM Encodings of Cryptographic Objects (2nd preview).
Java adds a preview API for encoding and decoding PEM keys, certificates, and CRLs, adding support for one of the most widely used crypto formats.

🔒 JEP 500 – Prepare to Make Final Mean Final.
The runtime begins warning about deep reflection that mutates final fields, laying the groundwork for stronger JVM integrity by default.

🕰️ JEP 526 – Lazy Constants (2nd preview).
LazyConstant enables deferred immutability: values are initialized on first use, then treated by the JVM like true constants, helping reduce startup costs without sacrificing immutability.

🧵 JEP 525 – Structured Concurrency (6th preview).
StructuredTaskScope continues to evolve, treating a group of related tasks as a single unit of work, simplifying cancellation/error handling and improving observability.

🔣 JEP 530 – Primitive Types in Patterns, instanceof, and switch (4th preview).
Pattern matching expands to support all primitive types across pattern contexts, with well-defined, safe conversion rules.

🌐 JEP 517 – HTTP/3 for the HTTP Client API.
java․ net․http․HttpClient gains HTTP/3 support with minimal API changes and transparent fallback to HTTP/2 or HTTP/1.1 when a server doesn’t support it.

⚡ JEP 516 – Ahead-of-Time Object Caching with Any GC.
HotSpot’s AOT cache from Project Leyden now works with any GC, including ZGC, by using a GC-agnostic format that can be streamed into the heap, cutting warm-up and startup costs without GC trade-offs.

📈 JEP 522 – G1 GC: Improve Throughput by Reducing Synchronization.
G1, the default GC, reduces synchronization overhead by simplifying write barriers (via a second card table), yielding better throughput in write-heavy workloads.