Backend development with Kotlin
Kotlin is a great fit for developing server-side applications. With Kotlin, you can write concise and expressive code while maintaining full compatibility with existing Java-based technology stacks.
Get started
Kotlin supports gradual migration of large codebases from Java to Kotlin. You can start writing tests or new production code in Kotlin while keeping other parts of your project in Java.
Configure your Java project to work with Kotlin and make use of the automated Java-to-Kotlin converter included in IntelliJ IDEA:
Explore frameworks
Kotlin is fully compatible with all Java-based frameworks, so you can use your familiar technology stack while benefiting from Kotlin syntax. In addition to great IDE support, Kotlin offers framework-specific tooling, such as support for Spring and Ktor in IntelliJ IDEA Ultimate.
Spring
Spring makes use of Kotlin's language features to offer more concise APIs. The online project generator allows you to quickly generate a new project in Kotlin.
Ktor
Ktor is a JetBrains framework for creating web applications in Kotlin. It uses coroutines for high scalability and offers an easy-to-use idiomatic API.
Other frameworks
Here are some other examples of the backend frameworks for Kotlin:
Framework | Description |
|---|---|
An open-sourced framework that provides first-class support for Kotlin. Quarkus was built from the ground up for Kubernetes and provides a cohesive full-stack framework by leveraging a growing list of hundreds of best-of-breed libraries. | |
A framework for building reactive web applications on the JVM. Vert.x offers dedicated support for Kotlin, including integration of Kotlin coroutines. | |
A DSL that can be used to build HTML in web applications. It serves as an alternative to traditional templating systems such as JSP and FreeMarker. | |
A modern JVM-based full-stack framework for building modular, easily testable microservices and serverless applications. Watch a webinar Micronaut for microservices with Kotlin and explore a detailed guide showing how you can use Kotlin extension functions in the Micronaut framework. | |
A functional toolkit with a small footprint for Kotlin HTTP applications, written in pure Kotlin. http4k provides the CLI-enabled toolbox to generate fully formed project templates, and a web-based project wizard to bootstrap a working http4k application with selected backend, modules, and build tooling. | |
A very lightweight web framework for Kotlin and Java which supports WebSockets, HTTP2, and async requests. |
Deploy your applications
Kotlin applications can be deployed to any host that supports Java web applications, including Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google Cloud Platform (GCP), and many others.
AWS provides a dedicated SDK for Kotlin to interact with its services. For serverless deployments, you can refer to AWS Lambda code examples for Kotlin.
Ktor allows you to publish Kotlin applications to various cloud providers. For instance, you can follow Ktor tutorials to learn more about deploying to Google App Engine and other services.
Spring applications are also compatible with most popular cloud providers. See how to deploy Spring Boot applications to the cloud in the official Spring documentation.