Java 8 - Difference between Optional.flatMap and Optional.map

Use map if the function returns the object you need or flatMap if the function returns an Optional. For example:

public static void main(String[] args) {
  Optional<String> s = Optional.of("input");
  System.out.println(s.map(Test::getOutput));
  System.out.println(s.flatMap(Test::getOutputOpt));
}

static String getOutput(String input) {
  return input == null ? null : "output for " + input;
}

static Optional<String> getOutputOpt(String input) {
  return input == null ? Optional.empty() : Optional.of("output for " + input);
}

Both print statements print the same thing.

They both take a function from the type of the optional to something.

map() applies the function "as is" on the optional you have:

if (optional.isEmpty()) return Optional.empty();
else return Optional.of(f(optional.get()));

What happens if your function is a function from T -> Optional<U>?
Your result is now an Optional<Optional<U>>!

That's what flatMap() is about: if your function already returns an Optional, flatMap() is a bit smarter and doesn't double wrap it, returning Optional<U>.

It's the composition of two functional idioms: map and flatten.

Note:- below is the illustration of map and flatmap function, otherwise Optional is primarily designed to be used as a return type only.

As you already may know Optional is a kind of container which may or may not contain a single object, so it can be used wherever you anticipate a null value(You may never see NPE if use Optional properly). For example if you have a method which expects a person object which may be nullable you may want to write the method something like this:

void doSome(Optional<Person> person){
  /*and here you want to retrieve some property phone out of person
    you may write something like this:
  */
  Optional<String> phone = person.map((p)->p.getPhone());
  phone.ifPresent((ph)->dial(ph));
}
class Person{
  private String phone;
  //setter, getters
}

Here you have returned a String type which is automatically wrapped in an Optional type.

If person class looked like this, i.e. phone is also Optional

class Person{
  private Optional<String> phone;
  //setter,getter
}

In this case invoking map function will wrap the returned value in Optional and yield something like:

Optional<Optional<String>> 
//And you may want Optional<String> instead, here comes flatMap

void doSome(Optional<Person> person){
  Optional<String> phone = person.flatMap((p)->p.getPhone());
  phone.ifPresent((ph)->dial(ph));
}

PS; Never call get method (if you need to) on an Optional without checking it with isPresent() unless you can't live without NullPointerExceptions.