List vs Set Difference In Java With Tutorial Updated In 2023

What We Are Learn On This Post

List VS Set In Java: In this article, we will discuss the difference between List and Set in detail i.e.; List v/s Set

Read: HashMap Vs Hashtable In Java

Both interfaces directly extend Collection interface, but they are a few differences between them Lets us move on and discuss key differences between them

List vs Set In Java

List	Set
It stores elements according to insertion order, insertion order is preserved	Set stores elements in random order, as it uses hashing techniqueInsertion order isn’t preserved
While iterating List items, elements will be retrieved as per insertion order	While iterating Set items, elements will be retrieved in random order
It allows duplicate elements	Set doesn’t allow duplicate elements i.e.; it stores only unique elementsNote: if the same element is added again, there won’t be any compile-time or runtime error, just that add() method returns false;
Any number of the NULL object is allowed to add to the List	Maximum of one NULL is allowed

When to use List?

If the business requirement is to preserve insertion order and
adding duplicate elements is not a big concern
then List is the good choice to store the group of elements
Example: it could be ArrayList or LinkedList or Vector, etc

When to use Set?

If the business requirement is to avoid storing duplicate elements
And storing only unique elements
Where insertion order isn’t a big factor while iterating items
then Set is the good choice to store the group of elements
Example: it could be HashSet, etc

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