AVAJAVA Web Tutorials

The instanceof operator allows you determine the type of an object. It takes an object on the left side of the operator and a type on the right side of the operator and returns a boolean value indicating whether the object belongs to that type or not. This is most clearly demonstrated with an example:

InstanceofTest.java

package test;

import java.util.Date;
import java.util.HashMap;
import java.util.Map;

public class InstanceofTest {

	public static void main(String[] args) {
		Map m = new HashMap();
		System.out.println("m instanceof Map: " + (m instanceof Map));
		System.out.println("m instanceof HashMap: " + (m instanceof HashMap));
		System.out.println("m instanceof Object: " + (m instanceof Object));
		System.out.println("m instanceof Date: " + (m instanceof Date));
		m = null;
		System.out.println("m = null, m instanceof HashMap: " + (m instanceof HashMap));
	}
}

If we execute the InstanceofTest class, we obtain the following results.

Console output from executing InstanceofTest

m instanceof Map: true
m instanceof HashMap: true
m instanceof Object: true
m instanceof Date: false
m = null, m instanceof HashMap: false

We started by creating a Map object that is implemented using a HashMap. Map is an interface. Notice from the results that m is both an instanceof Map and an instanceof HashMap. Thus, we can use interfaces in addition to classes on the right side of the instanceof operator.

From the results, also notice that m is an instanceof Object. This makes sense, since every object in JavaSW inherits from Object. The instanceof operator returns true if we ask if an object is an instanceof one of its parent classes.

Notice that m is not an instanceof Date, since m is a Map object and is not an implementation of the Date class.

A final behavior to be wary about when using instanceof is that if the value on the left side of the instanceof operator is null, the instanceof operator will return false, even if the value is typed to a particular class. Thus, even though the m variable has the type Map, it's null, so (m instanceof HashMap) returns false if m is null.