Reading a File to String in Java

Learn to read a text file into String in Java. Following examples use Files.readAllBytes(), Files.lines() (to read line by line) and FileReader and BufferedReader to read a file to String.

1. Using Files.readString() – Java 11

With the new method readString() introduced in Java 11, it takes only a single line to read a file’s content into String using the UTF-8 charset.

• In case of any error during the read operation, this method ensures that the file is properly closed.
• It throws OutOfMemoryError if the file is extremely large, for example, larger than 2GB.

Example 1: Reading the Complete File into a String

Path filePath = Path.of("c:/temp/demo.txt");

String content = Files.readString(fileName);

2. Using Files.lines() – Java 8

The lines() method reads all lines from a file into a Stream. The Stream is populated lazily when the stream is consumed.

• Bytes from the file are decoded into characters using the specified charset.
• The returned stream contains a reference to an open file. The file is closed by closing the stream.
• The file contents should not be modified during the reading process, else the result is undefined.

Example 2: Reading a File into Stream of Lines

Path filePath = Path.of("c:/temp/demo.txt");
StringBuilder contentBuilder = new StringBuilder();

try (Stream<String> stream 
  = Files.lines(Paths.get(filePath), StandardCharsets.UTF_8))
{
  //Read the content with Stream
  stream.forEach(s -> contentBuilder.append(s).append("\n"));
}
catch (IOException e)
{
  e.printStackTrace();
}

String fileContent = contentBuilder.toString();

3. Using Files.readAllBytes() – Java 7

The readAllBytes() method reads all the bytes from a file into a byte[]. Do not use this method for reading large files.

This method ensures that the file is closed when all bytes have been read or an I/O error, or other runtime exception, is thrown. After reading all the bytes, we pass those bytes to String class constructor to create a new String.

Example 3: Reading Entire File to byte[]

Path filePath = Path.of("c:/temp/demo.txt");
String fileContent = "";

try
{
    byte[] bytes = Files.readAllBytes(Paths.get(filePath));
    fileContent = new String (bytes);
} 
catch (IOException e) 
{
    e.printStackTrace();
}

4. Using BufferedReader – Java 6

If you are still not using Java 7 or later, then use BufferedReader class. Its readLine() method reads the file one line at a time and returns the content.

Example 4: Reading a File Line by Line

Path filePath = Path.of("c:/temp/demo.txt");
String fileContent = "";

StringBuilder contentBuilder = new StringBuilder();
try (BufferedReader br = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(filePath))) 
{

    String sCurrentLine;
    while ((sCurrentLine = br.readLine()) != null) 
    {
        contentBuilder.append(sCurrentLine).append("\n");
    }
} 
catch (IOException e) 
{
    e.printStackTrace();
}

fileContent = contentBuilder.toString();

5. Apache Commons IO

We can use the utility classes provided by the Apache Commons IO library.

The FileUtils.readFileToString() is an excellent way to read a whole file into a String in a single statement.

File file = new File("c:/temp/demo.txt");

String content = FileUtils.readFileToString(file, "UTF-8");

6. Google Guava

Guava also provides Files class that can be used to read the file content in a single statement.

File file = new File("c:/temp/demo.txt");

String content = com.google.common.io.Files.asCharSource(file, Charsets.UTF_8)
      .read();

Use any of the above-given methods for reading a file into a string using Java.

Happy Learning !!

Source Code on Github