Interface vs Abstract Class
- Methods and members of an abstract class can have any visibility (public, protected or public), while all methods of an interface must be public.
- A concrete child class of an abstract class must define all abstract methods. While, an abstract child class can have abstract methods.
- A child class can extend a single class. While, an interface can extend multiple interfaces. And a class can implement multiple interfaces.
- A child class can define abstract methods with any visibility (public, protected or public). Whereas class implementing an interface must define all interface methods as public.
- Abstract class can have constructor but not interfaces.
- Interface variables are public static final. Whereas abstract variables can be non-public, non-static and non-final.
- Abstract class can have both abstract and non-abstract methods unlike interfaces where all methods are abstract.
- Child class extending an abstract class with a constructor must provide a constructor with same arguments as abstract class’ constructor. Because otherwise default constructor of child class will call default constructor of abstract class with super, which will result in compilation error.