Uses of Class java.lang.LinkageError (Java Platform SE 8 )
Date: 2026-01-21

## Uses of Class
java.lang.LinkageError

- Packages that use LinkageError
  Package | Description
  --- | ---
  java.lang | Provides classes that are fundamental to the design of the Java programming language.
  java.lang.reflect | Provides classes and interfaces for obtaining reflective information about classes and objects.

- - ### Uses of LinkageError in java.lang

    Subclasses of LinkageError in java.lang
    Modifier and Type | Class and Description
    --- | ---
    `class` | `AbstractMethodError` Thrown when an application tries to call an abstract method.
    `class` | `BootstrapMethodError` Thrown to indicate that an `invokedynamic` instruction has failed to find its bootstrap method, or the bootstrap method has failed to provide a call site with a target of the correct method type.
    `class` | `ClassCircularityError` Thrown when the Java Virtual Machine detects a circularity in the superclass hierarchy of a class being loaded.
    `class` | `ClassFormatError` Thrown when the Java Virtual Machine attempts to read a class file and determines that the file is malformed or otherwise cannot be interpreted as a class file.
    `class` | `ExceptionInInitializerError` Signals that an unexpected exception has occurred in a static initializer.
    `class` | `IllegalAccessError` Thrown if an application attempts to access or modify a field, or to call a method that it does not have access to.
    `class` | `IncompatibleClassChangeError` Thrown when an incompatible class change has occurred to some class definition.
    `class` | `InstantiationError` Thrown when an application tries to use the Java `new` construct to instantiate an abstract class or an interface.
    `class` | `NoClassDefFoundError` Thrown if the Java Virtual Machine or a `ClassLoader` instance tries to load in the definition of a class (as part of a normal method call or as part of creating a new instance using the `new` expression) and no definition of the class could be found.
    `class` | `NoSuchFieldError` Thrown if an application tries to access or modify a specified field of an object, and that object no longer has that field.
    `class` | `NoSuchMethodError` Thrown if an application tries to call a specified method of a class (either static or instance), and that class no longer has a definition of that method.
    `class` | `UnsatisfiedLinkError` Thrown if the Java Virtual Machine cannot find an appropriate native-language definition of a method declared `native`.
    `class` | `UnsupportedClassVersionError` Thrown when the Java Virtual Machine attempts to read a class file and determines that the major and minor version numbers in the file are not supported.
    `class` | `VerifyError` Thrown when the "verifier" detects that a class file, though well formed, contains some sort of internal inconsistency or security problem.

  - ### Uses of LinkageError in java.lang.reflect

    Subclasses of LinkageError in java.lang.reflect
    Modifier and Type | Class and Description
    --- | ---
    `class` | `GenericSignatureFormatError` Thrown when a syntactically malformed signature attribute is encountered by a reflective method that needs to interpret the generic signature information for a type, method or constructor.

Submit a bug or feature
For further API reference and developer documentation, see Java SE Documentation. That documentation contains more detailed, developer-targeted descriptions, with conceptual overviews, definitions of terms, workarounds, and working code examples.
Copyright © 1993, 2026, Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Use is subject to license terms. Also see the documentation redistribution policy.