Why does Java allow arrays of size 0?

Question

Arrays in java are fixed in length. Why does Java allow arrays of size 0 then?

String[] strings = new String[0];

Answer 1

Another case where a zero length array can be useful: To return an array containing all of the elements in a list :

 T[ ] toArray(T[ ] a)

A zero length array can be used to pass the type of the array into this method. For example:

ClassA[ ] result = list.toArray(new ClassA[0]);

A zero length array is still an instance of Object which holds zero elements.