What are the Top 10 Books to Learn Java?

Books are considered to be the best companions and nothing can beat books when it comes to educating. That is the reason, most of the seasoned Java programmers, as well as experts, recommend books for learning Java. Books contain authentic and in-depth knowledge that is often written by a person having authority on the subject matter. Thus I bring you this article, where I will be sharing you a list of top 10 books to learn Java. I have categorized the books into two sections. The first one will be based on fresher’s point of view while the other is based on experienced professionals which will help them in gaining skills to upgrade their careers.

Beginner’s Level

1. Head First Java
2. Clean Code – A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship
3. Java: The Complete Reference
4. Java Concurrency in Practice
5. Effective Java

Advanced Level

6. Java: A Beginner’s Guide
7. Java Performance: A Definitive Guide
8. Spring in Action
9. Test-Driven
10. Mastering Java Machine Learning

Let’s get started.

Beginner’s Level – Top 10 Books to learn Java

1. Head First Java

Author – Kathy Sierra & Bert Bates
Latest Edition – 2nd Edition
Publisher – Shroff/O’Reilly

If you are just getting started with Java there is no other book apt than Head First Java. This book is really simple that explains the concepts in layman terms and easily relates the java programming concepts to real-life analogies. This book covers all the OOPs concepts in great detail which makes the beginner to easily get the hang of programming in Java. A few other helpful topics covered in this book are common OO mistakes, distributed programming with RMI and network sockets, and threads along with 42 mind-bending puzzles for a thorough understanding of the concepts. Though this book hasn’t been updated after Java 5.0, still, it is an absolute stepping stone for a budding programmer. 

2. Clean Code – A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship

Author – Robert Cecil Martin, a.k.a. Uncle Bob
Latest Edition – 1st Edition
Publisher – Pearson Education

Clean code is one of the classic books preferred by Java programmers. If you are a noob, this book will definitely help you in constructing better code, which otherwise can be a bit challenging. While this book is mainly centered around the OOPs principles, you will find it divided into three sections based on the level of complexity of the concepts/principles. The first section mostly covers the patterns, practices, and principles which are the pillars for writing clean code. The next section covers a wide range of case studies in an ascending complexity order. Finally, the third section which is just one chapter focuses on a list of techniques gathered while curating the case studies in the previous section of this book. To conclude, I would say this book will give you a strong base for building knowledge on Java and teach you various programming techniques and practices that will eventually help you in day to day life as a programmer.

3. Java: The Complete Reference

Author – Herbert Schildt
Latest Edition – 11th Edition
Publisher – McGraw Hill Education

This book is one of the most recommended and easily available books to get your hands on Java programming. It might not be that helpful for a complete novice, but if you have a basic understanding of Java then this book will work wonders for you. As the name suggests it is a very convenient and comprehensive reference book with over 1000 pages. This book is well structured and fully featured source of Java programming with real-world examples. This book is a perfect tool for learning Java as it covers basic Java concepts such as Java 8 APIs, fundamental programming principles, Java language syntax, and keyword along with extensive topics like JavaBeans, servlets, applets, and swing. So if you are on a journey to master Java, this book is a perfect match for you. You can download the free PDF here.

4. Java Concurrency in Practice

Author – Brian Goetz with Tim Peierls, Joshua Bloch, Joseph Bowbeer, David Holmes, and Doug Lea
Latest Edition – 1st Edition
Publisher – Addison-Wesley Professional

This book is definitely not for the noobs but is definitely for programmers whose feet are already wet with Java programming. The Java Concurrency in Practice book is one of the best Java programming books out there if you want to gain a rich understanding of concepts such as concurrency and multithreading. It is very essential for any ardent Java developer but might appear a bit challenging at the beginning. Thus before you jump onto this book, I would suggest you get your basics down else this book will appear as an alien language book to you. But let me make one thing very clear, there is no better book than Java Concurrency for learning concurrency and multithreading in Java which for an integral part of this language. You can download your free PDF here.

5. Effective Java

Author – Joshua Bloch
Latest Edition – 3rd Edition
Publisher – Addison Wesley

The book Effective Java falls under the category of the must-have book for every Java programmer as well as Java aspirant. This book can be referred to along with other Java books or learning material. The book basically constitutes 78 best practices that help a programmer to code effectively. All the mentioned best practices in this book have been categorized into 11 distinct sections like Concurrency, Generics, and Methods. This makes the learning curve shallower and helps in better understanding. The book hands down something to the Java programmers of any skill level. The latest edition of the book is strongly built around Java 7, 8, and 9. You can download the free PDF here.

Advanced Level – Top 10 Books to learn Java

6. Java: A Beginner’s Guide

Author – Herbert Schildt
Latest Edition – 8th Edition
Publisher – McGraw-Hill Education

As the saying goes, never judge a book by its cover, well in this case by its title. Though the title says a Beginner’s Guide actually this book is very useful even for the seasoned Java programmers. It is one of the most comprehensive and complete books available in the market for learning Java. It comes with extensive hands-on exercises as well as a quiz section at the end of each chapter. This enables the reader to self-evaluate his or her learning journey. With the latest edition release, this book has been fully revised to include Java 11 SE which means it includes complex concepts like lambda expressions and functional interfaces. 

7. The Definitive Guide to Java Performance

Author – Scott Oaks
Latest Edition – 1st Edition
Publisher – O’Reilly Media

Delving further into advanced Java programming we come across concepts such as Garbage collection, JVM, and performance tuning, etc. The only way of mastering these concepts is through the book Java Performance. This book covers all of the above-mentioned topics in a simple yet effective manner. This book will teach you how to maximize Java threading and synchronization performance features, improve Java-driven database application performance, tackle performance issues in Java EE and Java SE APIs, etc. You can download your free PDF from this link.

8. Spring in Action

Author – Craig Walls
Latest Edition – 5th Edition
Publisher – Manning Publications

Learning Java will always be incomplete without learning about at least one of its frameworks. Spring is one of the most heavily used Java frameworks for web application development. You can learn it easily through this Spring in Action book. It doesn’t just focus on the Spring framework, but along the course, you will delve deeper into concepts like JDBC to find out the unseen shortcomings of JDK, etc. Not just this, this book will also tell you how the Spring framework helps in filling up these small yet significant gaps. One thing is for sure, once you are through this book you will discover new horizons of Java.

9. Test-Driven: TDD and Acceptance TDD for Java Developers

Author – Lasse Koskela
Latest Edition – 1st Edition
Publisher – Manning Publications

For the programmers who want to change their field from development to testing, this book is a perfect solution for you. This is an excellent book for learning how to build unique automation testing programs. This book provides industry-based examples to test drive Java code. It also covers topics like acceptance test-driven development, the Fit framework, and testing Java EE components – JSPs, Servlets, and Spring Controllers. So if you are among those who prioritize code quality as well as have a knack for writing unit, integration, and automation tests this book is definitely for you. You can download the free PDF here.

10.  Mastering Java Machine Learning

Author – Uday Kamath
Latest Edition – 2nd Edition
Publisher – Packt Publishing

This book covers a wide range of topics that are used rigorously today in the machine learning domain. Through this book, you will gain a comprehensive knowledge of linear algebra, probability, and statistics. Not only this, but through the Java Machine Learning book, you will also learn about standard issues such as text-mining, classification, clustering, big data, and machine learning. The main highlight of this book is that it is loaded with 10 real-world case studies each of them highlighting various techniques of machine learning. So in case you have already mastered Java, this will help you in exploring the new domain of Machine Learning. You can get this book here.

There you go! This was my list of some of the best books to learn Java as preferred by most of the Java programmers. If you have suggestions to improve this list, do share them in the comment section below. We would be glad to hear it from you.

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