Setting JAVA_HOME on macOS

Some Java applications and build tools rely on the JAVA_HOME environment variable to locate the intended JDK. macOS provides /usr/libexec/java_home, which is preferable to guessing an installation path.

Confirm Java Is Available

which java

Then resolve the Java home directory:

/usr/libexec/java_home

For the environment used when this article was written, the result looked similar to:

/Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/jdk1.7.0_79.jdk/Contents/Home

Set JAVA_HOME for the Current Shell Session

export JAVA_HOME=$(/usr/libexec/java_home)
echo $JAVA_HOME

If you need a specific installed version, use the -v option, for example:

export JAVA_HOME=$(/usr/libexec/java_home -v 1.7)

Persist JAVA_HOME

The original article used ~/.bash_profile, which was common on macOS at the time. Add an export statement to the startup file used by your shell and then start a new terminal session.

Version context: Modern macOS commonly uses zsh rather than Bash as the default shell, so the appropriate configuration file may now be ~/.zshrc or another shell-specific startup file.

Takeaway

Resolve the JDK path dynamically with java_home where possible. It is less brittle than embedding a version-specific installation path directly into scripts or configuration files.