Build Systems
This version is still in development and is not considered stable yet. For the latest stable version, please use Spring Boot 4.1.1!

It is strongly recommended that you choose a build system that supports dependency management and that can consume artifacts published to the Maven Central repository. We would recommend that you choose Maven or Gradle. It is possible to get Spring Boot to work with other build systems (Ant, for example), but they are not particularly well supported.

Dependency Management

Each release of Spring Boot provides a curated list of dependencies that it supports. In practice, you do not need to provide a version for any of these dependencies in your build configuration, as Spring Boot manages that for you. When you upgrade Spring Boot itself, these dependencies are upgraded as well in a consistent way.
You can still specify a version and override Spring Boot’s recommendations if you need to do so.

The curated list contains all the Spring modules that you can use with Spring Boot as well as a refined list of third party libraries. The list is available as a standard Bills of Materials (spring-boot-dependencies) that can be used with both Maven and Gradle.
Each release of Spring Boot is associated with a base version of the Spring Framework. We highly recommend that you do not specify its version.

Maven

To learn about using Spring Boot with Maven, see the documentation for Spring Boot’s Maven plugin:

Gradle

To learn about using Spring Boot with Gradle, see the documentation for Spring Boot’s Gradle plugin:

Ant

It is possible to build a Spring Boot project using Apache Ant+Ivy. The spring-boot-antlib “AntLib” module is also available to help Ant create executable jars.

To declare dependencies, a typical ivy.xml file looks something like the following example:

<ivy-module version="2.0">
    <info organisation="org.springframework.boot" module="spring-boot-sample-ant" />
    <configurations>
        <conf name="compile" description="everything needed to compile this module" />
        <conf name="runtime" extends="compile" description="everything needed to run this module" />
    </configurations>
    <dependencies>
        <dependency org="org.springframework.boot" name="spring-boot-starter"
            rev="${spring-boot.version}" conf="compile" />
    </dependencies>
</ivy-module>

A typical build.xml looks like the following example:

<project
    xmlns:ivy="antlib:org.apache.ivy.ant"
    xmlns:spring-boot="antlib:org.springframework.boot.ant"
    name="myapp" default="build">

    <property name="spring-boot.version" value="4.1.3-SNAPSHOT" />

    <target name="resolve" description="--> retrieve dependencies with ivy">
        <ivy:retrieve pattern="lib/[conf]/[artifact]-[type]-[revision].[ext]" />
    </target>

    <target name="classpaths" depends="resolve">
        <path id="compile.classpath">
            <fileset dir="lib/compile" includes="*.jar" />
        </path>
    </target>

    <target name="init" depends="classpaths">
        <mkdir dir="build/classes" />
    </target>

    <target name="compile" depends="init" description="compile">
        <javac srcdir="src/main/java" destdir="build/classes" classpathref="compile.classpath" />
    </target>

    <target name="build" depends="compile">
        <spring-boot:exejar destfile="build/myapp.jar" classes="build/classes">
            <spring-boot:lib>
                <fileset dir="lib/runtime" />
            </spring-boot:lib>
        </spring-boot:exejar>
    </target>
</project>
If you do not want to use the spring-boot-antlib module, see the Build an Executable Archive From Ant without Using spring-boot-antlib section of “How-to Guides”.

Starters

Starters are a set of convenient dependency descriptors that you can include in your application. You get a one-stop shop for all the Spring and related technologies that you need without having to hunt through sample code and copy-paste loads of dependency descriptors. For example, if you want to get started using Spring and JPA for database access, include the spring-boot-starter-data-jpa dependency in your project.

The starters contain a lot of the dependencies that you need to get a project up and running quickly and with a consistent, supported set of managed transitive dependencies.

The following application starters are provided by Spring Boot under the org.springframework.boot group:

Table 1. Spring Boot application starters

Name Description
spring-boot-starter Core starter, including auto-configuration support, logging and YAML
spring-boot-starter-activemq Starter for using Apache ActiveMQ and JMS
spring-boot-starter-activemq-test Starter for testing using Apache ActiveMQ and JMS
spring-boot-starter-actuator-test Starter for testing Spring Boot’s Actuator which provides production ready features to help you monitor and manage your application
spring-boot-starter-amqp Starter for using Spring AMQP and Rabbit MQ
spring-boot-starter-amqp-test Starter for testing Spring AMQP and Rabbit MQ
spring-boot-starter-artemis Starter for using Apache Artemis and JMS
spring-boot-starter-artemis-test Starter for testing Apache Artemis and JMS
spring-boot-starter-aspectj Starter for using aspect-oriented programming with AspectJ
spring-boot-starter-aspectj-test Starter for testing aspect-oriented programming with AspectJ
spring-boot-starter-batch Starter for using Spring Batch
spring-boot-starter-batch-data-mongodb Starter for using Spring Batch with Data MongoDB
spring-boot-starter-batch-data-mongodb-test Starter for testing using Spring Batch with Data MongoDB
spring-boot-starter-batch-jdbc Starter for using Spring Batch with JDBC
spring-boot-starter-batch-jdbc-test Starter for testing using Spring Batch with JDBC
spring-boot-starter-batch-test Starter for testing using Spring Batch
spring-boot-starter-cache Starter for using Spring’s caching support
spring-boot-starter-cache-test Starter for testing Spring’s caching support
spring-boot-starter-cassandra Starter for using Cassandra distributed database
spring-boot-starter-cassandra-test Starter for testing Cassandra distributed database
spring-boot-starter-classic Core classic starter, including full auto-configuration support, logging and YAML
spring-boot-starter-cloudfoundry Starter for using Cloud Foundry
spring-boot-starter-cloudfoundry-test Starter for testing Cloud Foundry
spring-boot-starter-couchbase Starter for using Couchbase document-oriented database
spring-boot-starter-couchbase-test Starter for testing Couchbase document-oriented database
spring-boot-starter-data-cassandra Starter for using Cassandra distributed database and Spring Data Cassandra
spring-boot-starter-data-cassandra-reactive Starter for using Cassandra distributed database and Spring Data Cassandra Reactive
spring-boot-starter-data-cassandra-reactive-test Starter for testing Cassandra distributed database and Spring Data Cassandra Reactive
spring-boot-starter-data-cassandra-test Starter for testing Cassandra distributed database and Spring Data Cassandra
spring-boot-starter-data-couchbase Starter for using Couchbase document-oriented database and Spring Data Couchbase
spring-boot-starter-data-couchbase-reactive Starter for using Couchbase document-oriented database and Spring Data Couchbase Reactive
spring-boot-starter-data-couchbase-reactive-test Starter for testing Couchbase document-oriented database and Spring Data Couchbase Reactive
spring-boot-starter-data-couchbase-test Starter for testing Couchbase document-oriented database and Spring Data Couchbase
spring-boot-starter-data-elasticsearch Starter for using Elasticsearch search and analytics engine and Spring Data Elasticsearch
spring-boot-starter-data-elasticsearch-test Starter for testing Elasticsearch search and analytics engine and Spring Data Elasticsearch
spring-boot-starter-data-jdbc Starter for using Spring Data JDBC
spring-boot-starter-data-jdbc-test Starter for testing Spring Data JDBC
spring-boot-starter-data-jpa Starter for using Spring Data JPA with Hibernate
spring-boot-starter-data-jpa-test Starter for testing Spring Data JPA with Hibernate
spring-boot-starter-data-ldap Starter for using Spring Data LDAP
spring-boot-starter-data-ldap-test Starter for testing Spring Data LDAP
spring-boot-starter-data-mongodb Starter for using MongoDB document-oriented database and Spring Data MongoDB
spring-boot-starter-data-mongodb-reactive Starter for using MongoDB document-oriented database and Spring Data MongoDB Reactive
spring-boot-starter-data-mongodb-reactive-test Starter for using MongoDB document-oriented database and Spring Data MongoDB Reactive
spring-boot-starter-data-mongodb-test Starter for testing MongoDB document-oriented database and Spring Data MongoDB
spring-boot-starter-data-neo4j Starter for using Neo4j graph database and Spring Data Neo4j
spring-boot-starter-data-neo4j-test Starter for testing Neo4j graph database and Spring Data Neo4j
spring-boot-starter-data-r2dbc Starter for using Spring Data R2DBC
spring-boot-starter-data-r2dbc-test Starter for testing Spring Data R2DBC
spring-boot-starter-data-redis Starter for using Redis key-value data store with Spring Data Redis and the Lettuce client
spring-boot-starter-data-redis-reactive Starter for using Redis key-value data store with Spring Data Redis reactive and the Lettuce client
spring-boot-starter-data-redis-reactive-test Starter for testing Redis key-value data store with Spring Data Redis reactive and the Lettuce client
spring-boot-starter-data-redis-test Starter for testing Redis key-value data store with Spring Data Redis and the Lettuce client
spring-boot-starter-data-rest Starter for using Spring Data repositories exposed over REST using Spring Data REST and Spring MVC
spring-boot-starter-data-rest-test Starter for testing Spring Data repositories exposed over REST using Spring Data REST and Spring MVC
spring-boot-starter-elasticsearch Starter for using Elasticsearch search and analytics engine
spring-boot-starter-elasticsearch-test Starter for testing Elasticsearch search and analytics engine
spring-boot-starter-flyway Starter for using Flyway database migrations
spring-boot-starter-flyway-test Starter for testing Flyway database migrations
spring-boot-starter-freemarker Starter for using FreeMarker
spring-boot-starter-freemarker-test Starter for testing FreeMarker
spring-boot-starter-graphql Starter using Spring GraphQL
spring-boot-starter-graphql-test Starter for testing Spring GraphQL
spring-boot-starter-groovy-templates Starter for using Groovy Templates
spring-boot-starter-groovy-templates-test Starter for testing Groovy Templates
spring-boot-starter-grpc-client Starter for using Spring gRPC client
spring-boot-starter-grpc-client-test Starter for testing gRPC client
spring-boot-starter-grpc-server Starter for using Spring gRPC server
spring-boot-starter-grpc-server-test Starter for testing gRPC server
spring-boot-starter-gson Starter for using GSON
spring-boot-starter-gson-test Starter for testing GSON
spring-boot-starter-hateoas Starter for using Spring HATEOS to build hypermedia-based RESTful Spring MVC web applications
spring-boot-starter-hateoas-test Starter for testing Spring HATEOS to build hypermedia-based RESTful Spring MVC web applications
spring-boot-starter-hazelcast Starter for using Hazelcast
spring-boot-starter-hazelcast-test Starter for testing Hazelcast
spring-boot-starter-integration Starter for using Spring Integration
spring-boot-starter-integration-test Starter for testing Spring Integration
spring-boot-starter-jackson Starter for using Jackson
spring-boot-starter-jackson-test Starter for testing Jackson
spring-boot-starter-jdbc Starter for using JDBC with the HikariCP connection pool
spring-boot-starter-jdbc-test Starter for testing JDBC with the HikariCP connection pool
spring-boot-starter-jersey Starter for using JAX-RS and Jersey
spring-boot-starter-jersey-test Starter for testing JAX-RS and Jersey
spring-boot-starter-jetty Starter for using Jetty as the embedded servlet container
spring-boot-starter-jms Starter for using JMS
spring-boot-starter-jms-test Starter for testing JMS
spring-boot-starter-jooq Starter for using jOOQ to access SQL databases with JDBC
spring-boot-starter-jooq-test Starter for testing jOOQ to access SQL databases with JDBC
spring-boot-starter-json Starter for reading and writing JSON
spring-boot-starter-jsonb Starter for using JSON-B
spring-boot-starter-jsonb-test Starter for testing JSON-B
spring-boot-starter-kafka Starter for using Apache Kafka
spring-boot-starter-kafka-test Starter for testing Apache Kafka
spring-boot-starter-kotlinx-serialization-json Starter for using Kotlinx Serialization JSON
spring-boot-starter-kotlinx-serialization-json-test Starter for testing Kotlinx Serialization JSON
spring-boot-starter-ldap Starter for using LDAP
spring-boot-starter-ldap-test Starter for testing LDAP
spring-boot-starter-liquibase Starter for using Liquibase database migrations
spring-boot-starter-liquibase-test Starter for testing Liquibase database migrations
spring-boot-starter-mail Starter for using Java Mail and Spring Framework’s email sending support
spring-boot-starter-mail-test Starter for testing Java Mail and Spring Framework’s email sending support
spring-boot-starter-micrometer-metrics Starter for using Micrometer Metrics
spring-boot-starter-micrometer-metrics-test Starter for testing Micrometer Metrics
spring-boot-starter-mongodb Starter for using MongoDB document-oriented database
spring-boot-starter-mongodb-test Starter for testing MongoDB document-oriented database
spring-boot-starter-mustache Starter for using Mustache
spring-boot-starter-mustache-test Starter for testing Mustache
spring-boot-starter-neo4j Starter for using Neo4j graph database
spring-boot-starter-neo4j-test Starter for testing Neo4j graph database
spring-boot-starter-oauth2-authorization-server Starter for using Spring Authorization Server features (deprecated in favor of spring-boot-starter-security-oauth2-authorization-server)
spring-boot-starter-oauth2-client Starter for using Spring Security’s OAuth2/OpenID Connect client features (deprecated in favor of spring-boot-starter-security-oauth2-client)
spring-boot-starter-oauth2-resource-server Starter for using Spring Security’s OAuth2 resource server features (deprecated in favor of spring-boot-starter-security-oauth2-resource-server)
spring-boot-starter-opentelemetry Starter for using OpenTelemetry
spring-boot-starter-opentelemetry-test Starter for testing OpenTelemetry
spring-boot-starter-pulsar Starter for using Spring for Apache Pulsar
spring-boot-starter-pulsar-test Starter for testing Spring for Apache Pulsar
spring-boot-starter-quartz Starter for using the Quartz scheduler
spring-boot-starter-quartz-test Starter for testing the Quartz scheduler
spring-boot-starter-r2dbc Starter for using R2DBC
spring-boot-starter-r2dbc-test Starter for testing R2DBC
spring-boot-starter-reactor-netty Starter for Reactor Netty
spring-boot-starter-restclient Starter using Spring’s blocking HTTP clients (RestClient, RestTemplate and HTTP Service Clients)
spring-boot-starter-restclient-test Starter for testing Spring’s blocking HTTP clients (RestClient, RestTemplate and HTTP Service Clients)
spring-boot-starter-rsocket Starter for using RSocket
spring-boot-starter-rsocket-test Starter for testing RSocket
spring-boot-starter-security Starter for using Spring Security
spring-boot-starter-security-oauth2-authorization-server Starter for using Spring Authorization Server features
spring-boot-starter-security-oauth2-authorization-server-test Starter for testing Spring Authorization Server features
spring-boot-starter-security-oauth2-client Starter for using Spring Security’s OAuth2/OpenID Connect client features
spring-boot-starter-security-oauth2-client-test Starter for testing Spring Security’s OAuth2/OpenID Connect client features
spring-boot-starter-security-oauth2-resource-server Starter for using Spring Security’s OAuth2 resource server features
spring-boot-starter-security-oauth2-resource-server-test Starter for testing Spring Security’s OAuth2 resource server features
spring-boot-starter-security-saml2 Starter for using Spring Security with SAML2
spring-boot-starter-security-saml2-test Starter for testing Spring Security with SAML2
spring-boot-starter-security-test Starter for testing Spring Security
spring-boot-starter-sendgrid Starter for using Spring Session with Sendgrid
spring-boot-starter-sendgrid-test Starter for testing Spring Session with Sendgrid
spring-boot-starter-session-data-redis Starter for using Spring Session with Spring Data Redis
spring-boot-starter-session-data-redis-test Starter for testing Spring Session with Spring Data Redis
spring-boot-starter-session-jdbc Starter for using Spring Session with JDBC
spring-boot-starter-session-jdbc-test Starter for testing Spring Session with JDBC
spring-boot-starter-test Starter for testing Spring Boot applications with libraries including JUnit Jupiter, Hamcrest and Mockito
spring-boot-starter-test-classic Classic starter for testing Spring Boot applications with libraries including JUnit Jupiter, Hamcrest and Mockito
spring-boot-starter-thymeleaf Starter for using Thymeleaf
spring-boot-starter-thymeleaf-test Starter for testing Thymeleaf
spring-boot-starter-tomcat Starter for using Tomcat as the embedded servlet container
spring-boot-starter-validation Starter for using Java Bean Validation with Hibernate Validator
spring-boot-starter-validation-test Starter for testing Java Bean Validation with Hibernate Validator
spring-boot-starter-web Starter for building web, including RESTful, applications using Spring MVC. Uses Tomcat as the default embedded container (deprecated in favor of spring-boot-starter-webmvc)
spring-boot-starter-web-server-test Starter for testing Spring Web Server
spring-boot-starter-web-services Starter for using Spring Web Services (deprecated in favor of spring-boot-starter-webservices)
spring-boot-starter-webclient Starter using Spring’s reactive HTTP clients (WebClient and HTTP Service Clients)
spring-boot-starter-webclient-test Starter for testing Spring’s reactive HTTP clients (WebClient and HTTP Service Clients)
spring-boot-starter-webflux Starter for using WebFlux and Reactor Netty
spring-boot-starter-webflux-test Starter for testing WebFlux and Reactor Netty
spring-boot-starter-webmvc Starter for using Spring MVC and Tomcat
spring-boot-starter-webmvc-test Starter for testing Spring MVC and Tomcat
spring-boot-starter-webservices Starter for using Spring Web Services
spring-boot-starter-webservices-test Starter for testing Spring Web Services
spring-boot-starter-websocket Starter for using Spring MVC WebSocket support
spring-boot-starter-websocket-test Starter for testing Spring MVC WebSocket support
spring-boot-starter-zipkin Starter for using Zipkin
spring-boot-starter-zipkin-test Starter for testing Zipkin

In addition to the application starters, the following starters can be used to add production ready features:

Table 2. Spring Boot production starters

Name Description
spring-boot-starter-actuator Starter for using Spring Boot’s Actuator which provides production ready features to help you monitor and manage your application

Finally, Spring Boot also includes the following starters that can be used if you want to exclude or swap specific technical facets:

Table 3. Spring Boot technical starters

Name Description
spring-boot-starter-jetty-runtime Starter for the Jetty runtime
spring-boot-starter-log4j2 Starter for using Log4j2
spring-boot-starter-logback Starter for logging using Logback
spring-boot-starter-logging Starter for logging default logging
spring-boot-starter-restdocs Starter for using Spring REST Docs
spring-boot-starter-tomcat-runtime Starter for the Tomcat runtime

To learn how to swap technical facets, please see the how-to documentation for swapping web server and logging system.
For a list of additional community contributed starters, see the in the spring-boot-starters module on GitHub.