Oracle Java licensing worries are percolating through the userbase
- Reference: 1770732073
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2026/02/10/oracle_java_licensing/
- Source link:
A study from Dimensional Research shows that 92 percent of the 2,000 respondents reported being concerned about Oracle Java pricing, up from 82 percent in the same survey last year. Those stating they were very concerned about the changes leapt from 19 percent in 2025 to 29 percent this year.
In 2023, [1]Oracle changed its Java SE subscription model , shifting from a per-user or per-processor basis to per-employee. Critics called the move "predatory" as organizations that were using little Java but had a large number of employees could be hit hard by the cost increase.
[2]
Later that year, [3]research from Gartner showed that costs could be between two and five times greater under the new licensing model for using the same software.
[4]
[5]
Anxiety over the new charging model is a major driver pushing Java users to look for alternatives. Eighty-one percent of users have migrated, are migrating, or plan to migrate all or some of their Oracle Java to an open source alternative, according to the survey of global tech pros.
A number of alternatives to Oracle exist for running OpenJDK applications in production, including Bellsoft Liberica, IBM Semeru, and Azul Platform Core. Concern over the licensing change continues to spike because awareness is still filtering through the user community, said Gil Tene, CTO and co-founder of Java support and technology provider Azul Systems, which commissioned the research.
[6]Strong Java LTS arrives with the release of 25
[7]Oracle VirtualBox licensing tweak lies in wait for the unwary
[8]Nearly 3 out of 4 Oracle Java users say they've been audited in the past 3 years
[9]Deal to 'save' UK colleges £45M in Oracle Java licensing fees followed audit requests
"For most of them, the way they find out is a conversation with an Oracle salesperson, and that conversation starts at some place in the organization, but then it takes a while for that to make it through the organization, to the people actually looking at financial implications and the budget."
Tene said the users were also waking up to the fact that a strategy to gradually move off Oracle Java does not solve the licensing problem.
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"The shift that happened about a little under three years ago is that they went from volume-based to employee-based pricing. It's enough for one employee in the company to use one copy of Java from Oracle, for the company to be on the hook for paying per employee, for the entire employee base," he claimed.
A separate study from Dimensional Research published last year found that 73 percent of Oracle Java users had been audited in the last three years.
Another pressure on Java costs has been the shift to the cloud. The latest Dimensional Research data shows 97 percent of participants have taken actions to reduce their public cloud costs, including using a high-performance Java platform (41 percent). However, 74 percent of organizations say they still have more than 20 percent unused compute capacity in their public cloud environments.
[11]
The Register has asked Oracle to comment. ®
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[1] https://www.theregister.com/2023/01/27/oracle_java_licensing_change/
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aYtkNh0_fDDBui0S-G813wAAAkI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/24/oracle_java_license_terms/
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aYtkNh0_fDDBui0S-G813wAAAkI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aYtkNh0_fDDBui0S-G813wAAAkI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2025/09/17/java_25_released/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/30/licensing_change_oracle_virtualbox/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/15/oracle_java_users_audited/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2025/06/20/uk_colleges_45m_saving_deal/
[10] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aYtkNh0_fDDBui0S-G813wAAAkI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[11] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aYtkNh0_fDDBui0S-G813wAAAkI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[12] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: Still?
>> what have they been doing for the last 7 years?
Kicking it down the road.
There are, as stated, open source alternatives. So people can be 'very concerned' all they like. But at this stage they need to look in the mirror.
Re: Still?
Same. It has been. Literally. Years. I did this myself, in less than a week, years ago, at a job from which I've since retired, because it was fscking YEARS ago, I can't even remember how long. Sometime around Java 9 I think. You build your app with an embedded runtime using jlink from the JDK you're building from, naming the modules you need, or if you can go fully modular that happens automatically, which you get from openjdk, adoptium, azul, whoever you like. Done. Forever done.
How are people *still* getting tripped up by this? How many do-nothing IT departments are there out there? How many orphaned app deployments from vendors who were stiffed so often they went out of business that you have to keep running on some ancient rig?
Re: Still?
Some vendors who are using it, are pushing the cost onto the customer.
In that case, the customer is on the hook for the Java costs, because they have to stick with the vendors product. Either that or shift vendor, and some markets have very little viable competition.
"The Register has asked Oracle to comment"
"Sorry, all our operators are busy censoring TikTok and screwing British councils. Please leave your number and we might eventually get back to you."
^ Thank you for the laugh of the day! XD
"Survey finds nine in ten customers concerned as pricing changes push many toward open source alternatives"
It's not only the initial charges but also the notorious licence compliance investigations that quite conveniently favour Oracle. Someone ought to tell Larry that price gouging is just so yesterday.
Seem legally dubious
This idea of charging licences based on the number of employees who *could potentially* run an application seems ludicrous.
Actually, it's worse than that. You could end up having to pay for employees who might not even have any technical ability - location, operating system, access controls, etc - to even run Java.
It's like Hertz leaving a car next to your car park with the keys in it and then trying to charge you rental fees for each day it's sat there.
Seems like a scam to me.
Re: Seem legally dubious
Of course its a scam, its a bloody massive dishonest scam.
What goes around comes around, that's the up side, they too will be screwed at some point by their greed.
Re: Seem legally dubious
'employees who might not even have any technical ability'
Oracle have heard rumours about people sent round to do the local garbage collection.
Re: Seem legally dubious
Typical Oracle licensing scam. Nothing new there. Move along...
Some of us predicted this move when the change was first announced. If you have not moved to an alternative Java JVM by now then you deserve everything that Oracle is going to throw at you.
Hive off all your Oracle Java applications ...
and servers into a separate company with one employee. That company then provides the services that run on Java.
Sounds like a nice idea but I suspect that this is forbidden somewhere in the license 'agreement'.
.
The word 'agreement' is a lie, it is an imposition. The worst thing is that Oracle can change it at will to catch customers out in ways that they could not have for-seen.
Still?
I wonder why we're still talking about Oracle in the context of Java. The company I was working for at the time switched across to openjdk back at the start of 2019 when licensing changes started, and didn't look back. If businesses are now concerned, what have they been doing for the last 7 years?