Frequently Asked Questions

How is GraalVM Licensed?

Oracle GraalVM is licensed under GraalVM Free Terms and Conditions (GFTC) including License for Early Adopter Versions. Subject to the conditions in the license, including the License for Early Adopter Versions, the GFTC is intended to permit use by any user including commercial and production use. Redistribution is permitted as long as it is not for a fee. Oracle GraalVM is also free to use on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure. For more information about Oracle GraalVM licensing, see the Oracle Java SE Licensing FAQ.

GraalVM Community Edition is distributed under version 2 of the GNU General Public License with the “Classpath” Exception. We also recommend checking the licenses of the individual GraalVM components (which are generally derivative of the license of a particular language).

Where Should I Report Bugs, Security Issues, or Enhancement Requests?

Please report any bugs or enhancement requests for GraalVM Community using GitHub Issues. Report Oracle GraalVM bugs or enhancement requests via My Oracle Support.

Any security vulnerabilities in either Oracle GraalVM or GraalVM Community should only be reported via email to [email protected]. Please consult our Reporting Vulnerabilities guide for more information on reporting security vulnerabilities. Do not use GitHub Issues to report security issues.

How do I Contribute to GraalVM?

We welcome contributions to GraalVM from the community and are thankful for past contributions both big and small. There are two common ways to contribute:

• By submitting GitHub issues for bug reports, questions, or requests for enhancements.
• By creating GitHub pull requests.

See how to become a GraalVM contributor. If you wish to contribute to the documentation, please check this guide.

How Can I Receive Updates about GraalVM?

We maintain three mailing lists:

• [email protected] – a low traffic announcement list used by the project maintainers;
• [email protected] – an open source user mailing list for general questions and discussions;
• [email protected] – a list for contributors and language implementors.

Additional ways to stay up-to-date with GraalVM development are to track GraalVM at the Medium blogging platform, follow the @graalvm Twitter handle, or watch the github.com/oracle/graal repository.

How Do I Get Support Updates?

Comprehensive Oracle GraalVM support is provided by the Oracle GraalVM team via My Oracle Support. Please verify if support services are activated with your account.

What is the GraalVM Release Schedule?

Starting with JDK 20 in June 2023, GraalVM will follow the JDK’s six-month release cadence. In addition, starting with JDK 20, GraalVM releases will only support the latest JDK version (just as Oracle OpenJDK releases do). This will simplify the choice of versions and ensure that developers have access to the latest Java features with each GraalVM release. Check the GraalVM release calendar.

As part of this alignment, GraalVM will adopt the JDK’s release numbering scheme based on the supported Java version. To avoid confusion with older releases, new releases will be named GraalVM for JDK <Java version>, for example GraalVM for JDK 20.

What Are the Available Distributions of GraalVM?

GraalVM is available as Oracle GraalVM and GraalVM Community Edition. Oracle GraalVM is based on Oracle JDK, whereas GraalVM Community Edition is based on OpenJDK. Oracle GraalVM can be downloaded from Oracle Java Downloads. GraalVM Community Edition can be obtained from GraalVM releases on GitHub.

There are also downstream distributions of GraalVM Community Edition from:

• Bellsoft Liberica Native Image Kit
• RedHat Mandrel

Which Microservice Frameworks Employ GraalVM Native Image?

Several Java microservice frameworks have accepted the GraalVM Native Image technology as a platform. Examples include: Micronaut, Spring, Helidon, and Quarkus. For these frameworks Native Image significantly reduces the startup time and runtime memory requirements.

See Frameworks Ready for Native Image.

Will GraalVM be Part of OpenJDK?

Oracle announced in October 2022 that it is contributing the most applicable portions of the GraalVM just-in-time compiler and Native Image to OpenJDK to more closely align the development of the GraalVM technologies with that of Java.

To deliver on the announcements, a new project Galahad has been proposed. Galahad will initially focus on the continued development and integration of the Graal just-in-time (JIT) compiler as an alternative to the existing HotSpot JIT compiler for possible inclusion in a future OpenJDK release. Later steps will target contributions related to the GraalVM Native Image technology, which will make it possible to compile the Graal JIT compiler ahead-of-time (AOT) so that it is available instantly at JVM start.

Are There Existing Real-World Production Deployments of GraalVM?

Several production deployments of GraalVM exist today. See the Use Cases section on GraalVM’s home page.

We thank early adopters of our technology who give us feedback on the project and help us develop new features.