

It doesn’t provide the full feature set from the Java EE, but that isn't necessarily a disadvantage. Tomcat is considered a web server instead of an application server because it functions as a web server and Servlet container.

Is Tomcat an Application Server, or a Web Server? It is the first Tomcat release to support Java Servlet 5.0, JavaServer Pages 3.0, Java Expression Language 4.0, WebSocket 2.0, and Authentication 2.0 specifications. Nowadays, Apache Tomcat is widely used by many companies as it implements many of the Java EE specifications, such as:Īpache Tomcat 10.0.x is the current Tomcat release at the time of this writing, and is still undergoing active development.

Since then, multiple volunteers from Sun contributed to the product which then led to a a top-level Apache project designation in 2005. Is Tomcat an Application Server, or Web Server?Īpache Tomcat is a popular open source web server and Servlet container for Java code.Īs the reference implementation of Java Servlet and Java Server Pages (JSP), Tomcat was started at Sun Microsystems, which later donated the code base to the Apache Software Foundation.In this blog, we give an overview of Apache Tomcat, including what it is, how it works, and why it continues to be a popular choice for Java users today. But why is it so popular, and how does it compare to other popular Java web servers and application servers? With 48% of developers using Apache Tomcat in 2022, it is one of the top Java technologies out there today.
