Difference between Java and Kotlin in Android with Examples

Kotlin

KOTLIN is a cross platform, statically types, general purpose programming language with type inference. KOTLIN is designed to interoperate fully with java but type inference allows its syntax to be more concise.KOTLIN is sponsored by JetBrains and Google through the Kotlin Foundation.

Java

JAVA is an Object Oriented Programming Language developed by JAMES GOSLING and colleagues at SUN MICRO SYSTEMS in 1991.The language was initially called OAK. It was developed as a full fledged programming language in which one can accomplish the same sorts of tasks and solve the similar problems that one can do in other programming languages such as BASIC,C++ etc.

Using Kotlin over Java language in Android

The most reason for introducing Kotlin to Android advancement was to decrease the number of lines of code and make development more convenient to prepare. Everything that can be done utilizing Java can be done utilizing Kotlin for Android development.

For example:

• No need of findViewByIds: It is used to find the first descendant view with the given ID.
  Java

  TextView text = (TextView) findViewById(R.id.textView);
  text.setText("Hello World");

  Kotlin
  

  textView.setText("Hello World")

• Free from Null Pointer Exception
• NullPointerExceptions are a tremendous source of disappointment for Java designers. In Kotlin, all sorts are non-nullable (incapable to hold null value) by default. If the code tries to use or return null in Kotlin, compile time error is shown.

  var a: String = "abc"
  // compilation error
  a = null

• Data Class: We often create classes to hold some data in it. In such classes, some standard functions are often derivable from the data. In Kotlin, this type of class is known as data class and is marked as data.

There are many differences in both these languages according to their features