Tuning the Parallel Collector
The Parallel collector is a generational throughput collector and is the default collector for server class machines running JDK 8 and older versions. Parallel GC works best for applications that require maximum throughput and can tolerate some seconds of pause time. Out of the box, it prioritizes high throughput first and low memory footprint second. You can add a maximum pause time goal to limit the amount of time the application threads are paused for a collection. If this tuning option is chosen, then Parallel GC will prioritize the maximum pause time goal first, then throughput. As long as it is meeting those two goals, it will also dynamically resize the Java heap to keep the JVM’s memory footprint as small as possible.
Further Reading
See “The Parallel Collector” in the HotSpot Virtual Machine Garbage Collection Tuning Guide for your version of the JDK:
Last reviewed on Sat Feb 01 2025 00:00:00 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time)