What is the order of values in an enum Java?
William Taylor
Updated on March 22, 2026
What is the order of values in an enum Java?
Each Enum type has a static values method that returns an array containing all of the values of the enum type in the order they are declared. This method is commonly used in combination with the for-each loop to iterate over the values of an enumerated type.
Is enum ordered?
the order of appearance of list of enum constants is called their “natural order“, and defines the order used by other items as well : compareTo() method, iteration order of values in EnumSet , EnumSet. range() . Enum constructors should be declared as private .
Does enum maintain order?
According to the documentation for Enumset, the iterator should return the Enum constants in the order in which they were declared. The iterator returned by the iterator method traverses the elements in their natural order (the order in which the enum constants are declared).
Can you sort an enum in Java?
If you just create a list of the enum values (instead of strings) via parsing, then sort that list using Collections. sort , it should sort the way you want. If you need a list of strings again, you can just convert back by calling name() on each element.
Does enum order matter?
The order of enums is often not considered important by developers. Yet adding another artifical ordinal just make things worse, because now you have take care that the numbers are different, and the meaning of the new ordering is still not clear.
What is the default value of enum in Java?
The default for one who holds a reference to an enum without setting a value would be null (either automatically in case of a class field, or set by the user explicitly).
How do I order an enum?
To order a collection based on an enum by value, you can do the following: var collection = new List(); var sortedCollection = collection. OrderBy(c=>(int)c. EnumProperty);
How do you order enums?
How do you sort enums?
Enum implements Comparable via the natural order of the enum (the order in which the values are declared). If you just create a list of the enum values (instead of strings) via parsing, then sort that list using Collections. sort , it should sort the way you want.
Can enum implement comparable?
An enum in Java implements the Comparable interface. It would have been nice to override Comparable ‘s compareTo method, but here it’s marked as final. The default natural order on Enum ‘s compareTo is the listed order.
What is an enum Java?
A Java Enum is a special Java type used to define collections of constants. More precisely, a Java enum type is a special kind of Java class. An enum can contain constants, methods etc. Java enums were added in Java 5.
Why enums are better than constants?
Enums limit you to the required set of inputs whereas even if you use constant strings you still can use other String not part of your logic. This helps you to not make a mistake, to enter something out of the domain, while entering data and also improves the program readability.
How to get all values present in enum in Java?
values () method can be used to return all values present inside enum. Order is important in enums.By using ordinal () method, each enum constant index can be found, just like array index. valueOf () method returns the enum constant of the specified string value, if exists.
What is the importance of orderorder in Enum?
Order is important in enums.By using ordinal () method, each enum constant index can be found, just like array index. valueOf () method returns the enum constant of the specified string value, if exists. enum can contain constructor and it is executed separately for each enum constant at the time of enum class loading.
How to check if an enum value is equal to string?
Test.LETTER is an enum so it will never be equal to a String, but its value can be equal to a String so you have to check directly using the value of the enum. Because String’s equals method is checking for the object received to be String as well. It should work if you try with Test.LETTER.toString ().
How to sort enum values in a list?
Enum implements Comparable via the natural order of the enum (the order in which the values are declared). If you just create a list of the enum values (instead of strings) via parsing, then sort that list using Collections.sort, it should sort the way you want.