Concurrent mark sweep collector explained

The concurrent mark sweep collector (concurrent mark-sweep collector, concurrent collector or CMS) was a mark-and-sweep garbage collector in the Oracle HotSpot Java virtual machine (JVM) available since version 1.4.1. It was deprecated on version 9^[1] and removed on version 14,^[2] so from Java 15 it is no longer available.^{[3] [4]}

HotSpot garbage collectors

See main article: HotSpot (virtual machine). The HotSpot JVM selects the default garbage collector based on several factors.^[5] The newer garbage-first collector (G1) was planned to replace CMS.^[6] That change was finally done in version 9.

To launch the JVM with this garbage collector you can add this property to the java command line -XX:+UseConcMarkSweepGC^{[7] [8]} when using java version less than 14.

See also

• List of Java virtual machines

Notes and References

1. Web site: JEP 291: Deprecate the Concurrent Mark Sweep (CMS) Garbage Collector.
2. Web site: JEP 363: Remove the Concurrent Mark Sweep (CMS) Garbage Collector.
3. Web site: JVM Garbage Collectors.
4. Web site: Release Note: JEP 363: Remove the Concurrent Mark and Sweep (CMS) Garbage Collector.
5. Web site: Garbage Collector Ergonomics.
6. Web site: Java HotSpot Garbage Collection.
7. Web site: Garbage Collectors.
8. Web site: Concurrent Mark Sweep Collector Enhancements.