Indicates that an annotated field or method is part of theserialization mechanism defined by theJava Object Serialization Specification. This annotation type is intended to allow compile-time checking of serialization-related declarations, analogous to the checking enabled by theOverride annotation type to validate method overriding.Serializable classes are encouraged to use@Serial annotations to help a compiler catch mis-declared serialization-related fields and methods, mis-declarations that may otherwise be difficult to detect.

Specifically, annotations of this type should be applied to serialization-related methods and fields in classes declared to beSerializable. The five serialization-related methods are:

• private void writeObject(java.io.ObjectOutputStream stream) throws IOException
• private void readObject(java.io.ObjectInputStream stream) throws IOException, ClassNotFoundException
• private void readObjectNoData() throws ObjectStreamException
• ANY-ACCESS-MODIFIERObject writeReplace() throws ObjectStreamException
• ANY-ACCESS-MODIFIERObject readResolve() throws ObjectStreamException

The two serialization-related fields are:

• private static final ObjectStreamField[] serialPersistentFields
• private static final long serialVersionUID

Compilers are encouraged to validate that a method or field marked with a@Serial annotation is one of the defined serialization-related methods or fields declared in a meaningful context and issue a warning if that is not the case.

It is a semantic error to apply this annotation to other fields or methods, including:

• fields or methods in a class that is notSerializable
• fields or methods of the proper structural declaration, but in a type where they are ineffectual. For example,enum types are defined to have aserialVersionUID of0L so aserialVersionUID field declared in anenum type is ignored. The five serialization-related methods identified above are likewise ignored for anenum type.
• in a class that isExternalizable:
  • method declarations ofwriteObject, readObject, andreadObjectNoData
  • a field declaration forserialPersistentFields
  While theExternalizable interface extends Serializable, the three methods and one field above arenot used for externalizable classes.

Note that serialization mechanism accesses its designated fields and methods reflectively and those fields and methods may appear otherwise unused in aSerializable class.