What is the difference between a float and a double in Java?

Question:

What is the difference between a float and a double in Java?

Answer:

The double data type is a double-precision 64-bit IEEE 754 floating point.
The float data type is a single-precision 32-bit IEEE 754 floating point.


See: http://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/java/nutsandbolts/datatypes.html

Code:

public class Ranges {
 
   public static void main(String[] args) {
 
      // double min / max.
      System.out.println("  Double.MAX_VALUE: " + Double.MAX_VALUE);
      System.out.println("  Double.MIN_NORMAL: " + Double.MIN_NORMAL);
 
      // float min / max.
      System.out.println("  Float.MAX_VALUE: " + Float.MAX_VALUE);
      System.out.println("  Float.MIN_VALUE: " + Float.MIN_VALUE);
 
   }
}

Output:

$ java Ranges
  Double.MAX_VALUE: 1.7976931348623157E308
  Double.MIN_NORMAL: 2.2250738585072014E-308
  Float.MAX_VALUE: 3.4028235E38
  Float.MIN_VALUE: 1.4E-45