Organizations are parting ways with Oracle Java for open-source alternatives

Oracle Java-reliant organizations are making like birds and migrating for more open skies.

According to a joint survey and report by the ITAM Forum and Azul, which surveyed 500 IT and software asset management Java-using professionals globally, 79% of organizations have already migrated from Oracle Java to an open-source alternative or plan to do so in the future.

The price is (not) right. The report claims that cost was the “most influential driver” for migrations from Oracle Java to open-source Java, with 31.7% saying they were very concerned about Big Red’s pricing and licensing policies for Oracle Java. IT Brew previously reported that cost was top of mind for many Oracle Java user organizations following its shift from a per-user and per-processor pricing model to an employee-based pricing model in 2023. This marked Oracle’s fourth change to its price and licensing model in the past four years, according to the report.

Scott Sellers, Azul president, co-founder, and CEO, previously told IT Brew that the new pricing model deviated away from a fair way to charge customers.

“If you have company A that’s 10,000 people and barely uses Java and another company that is exactly the same size, 10,000 employees, and widely uses Java, Oracle charges those companies the same amount of money, which is really nonsensical,” Sellers said.

Audit frenzy. Compliance was another motivator that led companies to jump to alternative providers. Almost three-fourths of surveyed organizations (73%) experienced an Oracle Java audit in the past three years.

Simultaneously, internal auditing was also common among companies as they attempted to avoid hefty bills by being overly attentive to their usage. More than one-fifth (22.8%) of organizations claimed they performed internal audits to make sure they were complying with Oracle Java-related licensing requirements. Another 22.8% said they were doing so on a continuous basis.

Security, scalability, and the desire to depend on a single vendor were among the other reasons organizations said they were considering migrating to an open-source Java alternative.

The compelling case for change. When asked how much they expected to save from migrating to an open-source Java alternative, 66% of organizations estimated at least a 40% spend cut.

“This result underscores the compelling case for open-source Java and why so many participants are migrating off Oracle to an open-source (OpenJDK) alternative,” the report concluded.