--- title: What is the difference between ByteBuffer and... description: A comparison of Java's ByteBuffer (Java 4, 2002) and MemorySegment (Java 22, 2024) for off-heap memory access. Key differences: ByteBuffer uses 32-bit indexes... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/what-is-the-difference-between-bytebuffer-and-memorysegment---javalanguage-javacoding-javatips-lxwrwkxqp twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: What is the difference between ByteBuffer and MemorySegment? - #javalanguage #javacoding #javatips | daily.dev og:description: A comparison of Java's ByteBuffer (Java 4, 2002) and MemorySegment (Java 22, 2024) for off-heap memory access. Key differences: ByteBuffer uses 32-bit indexes... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/what-is-the-difference-between-bytebuffer-and-memorysegment---javalanguage-javacoding-javatips-lxwrwkxqp og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/lXwrwkxQP.png og:image:alt: What is the difference between ByteBuffer and MemorySegment? - #javalanguage #javacoding #javatips og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # What is the difference between ByteBuffer and MemorySegment? - #javalanguage #javacoding #javatips **[Java \(Official Oracle\)](https://daily.dev/sources/java-oracle)** · 1 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary A comparison of Java's ByteBuffer (Java 4, 2002) and MemorySegment (Java 22, 2024) for off-heap memory access. Key differences: ByteBuffer uses 32-bit indexes while MemorySegment uses 64-bit; ByteBuffer cannot be manually freed (risking OOM errors) while MemorySegment is obtained from an auto-closable Arena allowing on-demand deallocation; MemorySegment offers thread-access controls while ByteBuffer leaves concurrency management to the developer. The recommendation is to avoid ByteBuffer outside legacy code and adopt arenas, memory segments, and memory layouts instead. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [1B Rows with the Memory API](https://daily.dev/posts/1b-rows-with-the-memory-api-xyhivcu8q) · Inside Java · 2 upvotes · 0 comments - [Native Memory in Java: Arenas, Malloc, and Pools](https://daily.dev/posts/native-memory-in-java-arenas-malloc-and-pools-hyaefjfpb) · Foojay.io · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [Pointer Arithmetic in Modern Java](https://daily.dev/posts/pointer-arithmetic-in-modern-java-2c5ccltz0) · Foojay.io · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#java](https://daily.dev/tags/java) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/what-is-the-difference-between-bytebuffer-and-memorysegment---javalanguage-javacoding-javatips-lxwrwkxqp) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"What is the difference between ByteBuffer and MemorySegment? - #javalanguage #javacoding #javatips","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/what-is-the-difference-between-bytebuffer-and-memorysegment---javalanguage-javacoding-javatips-lxwrwkxqp","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/what-is-the-difference-between-bytebuffer-and-memorysegment---javalanguage-javacoding-javatips-lxwrwkxqp"},"datePublished":"2026-04-17T10:12:23.800Z","dateModified":"2026-04-17T10:12:40.492Z","description":"A comparison of Java's ByteBuffer (Java 4, 2002) and MemorySegment (Java 22, 2024) for off-heap memory access. 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