What is the jdk1.8 and why developers usually use the jdk1.8?

As a beginner of backend developer, there are many senior developers ask me what is the jdk. I simply answerd the jdk is java development kit, it helps developer to make java-based program and includes jre and jvm that can run java program on computer.

Before ask question at Stack Overflow, I've looked up what is jdk and why we usually use jdk1.8. However, I cannot find clear answer(maybe I'm not enough clever to understand what I found). Also, there are some answers that jdk is Java8 or some other version of Java. These kind of answers make me confused a lot.

Anyway, would you kindly answer me what is jdk and why developers usually use jdk1.8? Please tell me your opinions.

p.s) I'm a junior developer and I've been worked as a backend developer about an year.

I googled the jdk and looked up some information about jdk at oracle.net and the wikipedia. After understanding the definition of jdk, I hope to listen more clear answers from senior developers.

There came up a lot of changes and new features when jdk1.7 upgraded to jdk1.8. Such as lamda and funtional programming.Also, there are a lot of optimizations on jdk utilities like implementation of hashmap.Coding with jkd1.8 can be a big convinience comparing to with jdk1.7.

It's a Java version 8. But it's deprecated now, here's the list of java versions. The why developers use java 8, maybe when you looking for tutorials they created it when java 8 is still exists.

I suggest to use minimum version 11 or 17 LTS instead. For the features, Java 11 is similar to Java 8. But Java 17 has much more features.

The concepts

JRE (Java Runtime Environment) provides basic/standard libraries, JVM and other basic components that run your compiled code in the machine.

JDK (Java Development Kit) can be seen as an extended version of the JRE which in addition to what the JRE provides is also capable to compile your source code into byte-code understandable by the JVM, debugging tools and other things that are helpful during development phase.

What is JDK1.8

It is just one of the many versions of the JDK. Having big improvements from It's predecessor JDK1.7 with new features such as lambda expressions, Streams support, among others it impulse the language towards a more friendly approach to functional programming style, among other improvements.

Why JDK1.8

A few years back it became "the new thing", to the point that many frameworks started cutting support for older versions of Java, and it became the preferred environment to use.

However it should not be seen as an standard since technology is a fast evolving environment, and newer versions will always boost performance, have more interesting features that boost your productivity, etc.

Current status (2023)

Java 8 (and JDK 1.8) do not receive any new features, or patches for security updates, so that is one of the reasons I wouldn't call it an standard, even though is probably still largely used.

Always keep an eye to the end of life dates of versions and also the newer versions releases: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Java_version_history

Especially look at the LTS (Long Term Support) releases as those will receive support for extended periods, while other versions will test-out new features.