Oracle adds GraalVM to Java subscription

Oracle is now bundling the GraalVM Enterprise multi-language runtime with its Java SE subscription at no additional cost, with the intent of improving performance and memory efficiency for Java deployments.

The bundling went into effect on February 3. GraalVM is positioned for high performance, accelerating the execution of applications written in Java and other JVM languages while also providing runtimes for languages including JavaScript and Python.

Normally, users would pay $18 per processor per month to use GraalVM Enterprise.  GraalVM Enterprise currently supports Java 8 and Java 11, which are long-term support releases of the platform. Oracle plans to support more current Java releases with GraalVM Enterprise. Specifically, GraalVM Enterprise provides:

• A high-performance JiT compiler that can plug into the HotSpot virtual machine to provide more optimizations for Java code.
• An ahead-of-time (AOT) native image compiler. Native image offers faster execution and lower compute requirements and is intended to reduce costs for infrastructure and cloud deployments. AOT puts Java performance on par with C and Go applications, making Java more suitable for microservices.
• Multi-language support for the JVM.

Oracle’s Java SE subscription provides licensing and support for use on desktops, on servers, and in the cloud. The subscription also features updates for performance, security, and stability as well as enterprise management and deployment capabilities. Information on accessing Oracle’s Java SE subscriptions can be found at oracle.com.

The GraalVM project has been intended to produce a better compiler for Java. GraalVM 21, with experimental Java support on the Truffle language implementation framework, was introduced on January 19.