Difference between @Autowiring ➿& @Inject 🔌

In article we looked at how wiring works in the spring framework, how to use the @Autowired annotation and different ways to use it.
Here we will briefly compare the @Autowired annotation with @Inject annotation.

Qualifier support

• @Autowired built-in support the qualifier to qualify which exact bean to use foe dependency injection.
• @Inject dose not have built-in support for qualifying the specific bean.

Standardization of annotation

• @Autowired is annotation specific to spring framework and dose not work outside spring context
• @Inject is part of java dependency injection (JSR-330).

Optional Dependency Support

• @Autowired supports the optional dependency with Optional<T>
• @Inject however dose not have built-in mechanism to make dependency as optional

Framework Integration

• @Autowired is specifically developed to use with the spring framework.
• @Inject is more general annotation can be used with any framework supporting the JSR-330

Note that both @Inject and @Autowired serve the purpose of dependency injection and can be used effectively in their respective contexts

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