Method Modifiers in Java - Java Language Tutorial

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This page shows a list of the different modifiers that a method can have, as well as examples of how to use them.
A method may contain zero or more modifiers

public, private, protected - These are all access modifiers which determines from where a method can be called. More about access modifiers later in this tutorial.

static - This modifier tells that the method is a class method and belongs to the class rather than an instance of the class.

synchronized - This is used for multithreaded applications. If a method is declared synchronized the thread that executes it must obtain a lock on the object that contains the method before it can be executed. Note that this is the case although a class may just have one method that is declared synchronized. If the method is static the lock must be obtained on the class.

abstract - A method that is declare abstract does not have a method body, the signature just ends with a semicolon. If a class has one or more methods that are declared abstract it must itself be declared abstract and cannot be instantiated.

final - A method declared final cannot be overridden by subclasses.

native - If a method is declared native it specifies that the method implementation is written in some "native" language such as C and is provided externally to the Java program. Just like the abstract modifier a method declared native does not have a method body, the signature ends with a semicolon.

Here are a few examples of modifiers:

    //A public abstract method
    public abstract void methodA();

    //A protected static method
    protected static void methodB() {

    }

    //A public synchronized final method
    public synchronized final void methodC() {

    }

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