Java was created by James Gosling at Sun Microsystems as a class-based alternative to C and C++.
Gosling and a team at Sun began developing the language in the early 1990s as part of the Green Project. It was initially called Oak, but the name was changed to Java before public release. Java was designed with familiar C-like syntax while emphasizing portability and automatic memory management.
Sun released Java publicly in 1995. Its “write once, run anywhere” goal was supported by the Java Virtual Machine, which executes Java bytecode on different operating systems. The language became especially prominent in web applets, enterprise systems, and Android software.
Java is often confused with JavaScript because of the similar names, but they are separate languages with different origins and designs. Java’s class-based object model and virtual-machine ecosystem remain central to its identity.