Variables and Data Types

There are eight primitive data types in Java:

• boolean
• byte
• short
• int
• long
• float
• double
• char

However there are only seven kinds of literals, and one of those is not a primitive data type:

• boolean: true or false
• int: 89, -945, 37865
• long: 89L, -945L, 5123567876L
• float: 89.5f, -32.5f,
• double: 89.5, -32.5, 87.6E45
• char: 'c', '9', 't'
• String: "This is a string literal"

There are no short or byte literals.

Strings are a reference or object type, not a primitive type. However the Java compiler has special support for strings so this sometimes appears not to be the case.

class Variables {

  public static void main (String args[]) {
  
    boolean b = true;
    int low = 1;
    long high = 76L;
    long middle = 74;
    float pi = 3.1415292f;
    double e = 2.71828;
    String s = "Hello World!";
    
  }
   
}