Top 100 Java Interview Questions for Experienced Developers

Author - Praveen Bishnoi

Core Java

1. Explain OOP principles and their implementation in Java.

2. What is the difference between String, StringBuilder, and StringBuffer?

3. Explain the hashCode() and equals() methods.

4. How does final, finally, and finalize() differ?

5. What are Java annotations? How are custom annotations created?

6. Explain Java memory management and garbage collection.

7. What are immutable objects, and how do you create them in Java?

8. Explain the working of synchronized in Java.

9. How does volatile differ from transient in Java?

10. What is the ExecutorService framework?

Collections Framework

11. Difference between ArrayList and LinkedList.

12. Explain HashMap internals and how collisions are handled.

13. What is the difference between HashSet and TreeSet?

14. Explain the fail-fast and fail-safe iterators.

15. What is the role of Comparable and Comparator interfaces?

16. Explain Concurrent Collections in Java.

17. How does ConcurrentHashMap work internally?

18. What are weak references in Java, and when are they used?

19. Difference between Queue and Deque.

20. How does TreeMap maintain order?

Multithreading and Concurrency

21. What are thread states in Java?

22. Explain ThreadLocal and its use cases.

23. What is the difference between wait(), notify(), and notifyAll()?

24. How does ReentrantLock work?

25. What are semaphores and their use cases?

26. What are daemon threads?

27. How does the Fork/Join framework work?

28. What is the difference between Callable and Runnable?

29. Explain deadlock, livelock, and starvation.

30. How can deadlocks be avoided in Java?

Java 8+ Features

31. Explain streams in Java.

32. What is the difference between map() and flatMap()?

33. How do Optional and ifPresent work?

34. What is the use of default methods in interfaces?

35. Explain method references and constructor references.

36. What is the purpose of the Collector class in Java?

37. Explain functional interfaces and provide examples.

38. How do you create custom collectors?

39. What are the new time and date APIs introduced in Java 8?

40. How do you implement parallel streams?

Design Patterns and Best Practices

41. Explain the Singleton design pattern.

42. How does the Factory pattern differ from the Builder pattern?

43. Explain Dependency Injection and how Spring implements it.

44. What are the SOLID principles in Java?

45. How does the Observer pattern work?

46. When would you use the Prototype pattern?

47. Explain the Template Method pattern.

48. What is the Strategy design pattern?

49. How does the Proxy pattern work in Java?

50. What is the difference between a decorator and an adapter?

Spring and Frameworks

51. What is the role of a DispatcherServlet in Spring MVC?

52. How does Spring Bean lifecycle work?

53. Explain the difference between @Component, @Service, @Repository, and @Controller.

54. How does Spring handle transactions?

55. Explain @Transactional annotation.

56. What is the difference between IOC and Dependency Injection?

57. How does Spring Boot auto-configuration work?

58. Explain @RestController and its difference from @Controller.

59. What are the key differences between Hibernate and JPA?

60. How does caching work in Spring?

Microservices

61. What are the core principles of microservices architecture?

62. How do you handle service discovery in microservices?

63. What is API Gateway, and why is it needed?

64. How do you implement distributed logging in microservices?

65. Explain the Circuit Breaker pattern and how to implement it.

66. What is the role of Eureka in Spring Cloud?

67. How does Hystrix ensure fault tolerance?

68. What is eventual consistency, and how do you achieve it?

69. How do you secure communication between microservices?

70. Explain the role of Docker and Kubernetes in microservices.

Performance and Scalability

71. How do you perform JVM tuning for performance optimization?

72. What tools do you use for profiling a Java application?

73. How do you identify memory leaks in Java?

74. Explain load testing and stress testing for Java applications.

75. What are the different garbage collectors in Java, and when would you use each?

76. How do you handle large datasets in memory?

77. Explain the use of connection pooling in JDBC.

78. What is caching, and how does it improve performance?

79. How do you optimize SQL queries in a Java application?

80. Explain the concept of batch processing in Java.

Miscellaneous

81. Explain the role of JMX in Java.

82. How does reflection work in Java?

83. What is the difference between checked and unchecked exceptions?

84. How do you use custom class loaders?

85. What is the difference between serialization and deserialization?

86. What are some common anti-patterns in Java development?

87. How do you ensure thread safety in Java applications?

88. What are the key differences between SOAP and REST APIs?

89. How do you implement versioning in RESTful web services?

90. What is a Java agent, and when would you use it?

Advanced Topics

91. Explain the Java Module System (introduced in Java 9).

92. How do you implement reactive programming in Java?

93. What are non-blocking I/O operations?

94. How does CompletableFuture work in Java?

95. What are the key features of Java 17 or later?

96. How do you ensure data integrity in a distributed system?

97. Explain CAP theorem in the context of distributed systems.

98. What is Zero-Copy in Java, and why is it used?

99. How do you implement multi-tenancy in Java applications?

100. Explain eventual consistency in distributed systems.