Java 8 Streams Filter Examples

Basic Filtering

Filters allow you to easily remove elements from a stream that you’re not interested in.

For example if we had a list of numbers, we can filter out any that are less than 3.

package xyz.byexample.java8;

import java.util.Arrays;
import java.util.List;
import java.util.stream.Collectors;

public class Filter {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        List<Integer> numbers = Arrays.asList(1,2,3,4,5);

        List<Integer> lessThanThree = numbers.stream()
                .filter((Integer number) -> {
                    return number < 3;
                })
                .collect(Collectors.toList());

        System.out.println(lessThanThree);
    }
}

Output

[1, 2]

Breaking that down:

numbers.stream() creates a new Stream that we’re going to operate on
filter(...) contains the Predicate that does the actual work of the filter (a Predicate here is just a fancy name for a function that returns true or false)
finally we use collect() to turn the Stream back into a collection and stores it in our list of lessThanThree.

This code is a much shorter than what we’re used to using without streams which is great news. Since this logic is so simple though, we can replace the filter(...) statement with an expression.

List<Integer> numbers = Arrays.asList(1,2,3,4,5);

List<Integer> lessThanThreeLambda = numbers.stream()
.filter(number -> number < 3)
.collect(Collectors.toList());

System.out.println(lessThanThree);

Output

[1, 2]

The output is identical, but we’ve made our code even shorter by using a simple lambda expression number -> number < 3:

Java uses type inference to work out that number is an Integer (because we’re operating on an Stream<Integer> object)
We can entirely remove the return statement
We dont need to use { and } braces/brackets.

Filters on Objects

As well as filtering on simple types, we can also filter on an object’s properties.

For example, imagine we had a simple Person class that stores the name and age of individuals. We can easily use filter() to get only those who are ages 18 years or over.

private static class Person {
    private Integer age;
    private String name;

    public Person(Integer age, String name) {
        this.age = age;
        this.name = name;
    }

    public Integer getAge() {
        return age;
    }

    public String getName() {
        return name;
    }
}

List<Person> people = Arrays.asList(
        new Person(12, "Adam"),
        new Person(18, "Bob"),
        new Person(27, "Alice"),
        new Person(9, "Beth")
);

List<Person> adults = people.stream()
        .filter(person -> person.getAge() >= 18)
        .collect(Collectors.toList());

adults.forEach(adult -> System.out.println(adult.getName()));

Output

Bob
Alice

Since Adam and Beth are under 18, we’ve filtered them out of the adults collection.

Removing nulls from a stream

If you have nulls in your stream it is trivial to remove those using a filter.

List<Person> people = Arrays.asList(
        new Person(12, "Adam"),
        new Person(18, "Bob"),
        null,
        new Person(27, "Alice"),
        new Person(9, "Beth"),
        null
);

List<Person> people = people.stream()
        .filter(person -> person != null)
        .collect(Collectors.toList());

people.forEach(adult -> System.out.println(adult.name));

Output

Adam
Bob
Alice
Beth

You can then easily chain that with extra filters - for example to filter out nulls, then filter on a property of the object, such as age in our example:

List<Person> people = Arrays.asList(
        new Person(12, "Adam"),
        new Person(18, "Bob"),
        null,
        new Person(27, "Alice"),
        new Person(9, "Beth"),
        null
);

List<Person> children = people.stream()
        .filter(person -> person != null)
        .filter(person -> person.getAge() < 18)
        .collect(Collectors.toList());

children.forEach(child -> System.out.println(child.getName()));

Output

Adam
Beth

byexample.xyz

Java 8 Streams Filter Examples

Basic Filtering

Filters on Objects

Removing nulls from a stream