What is hashCode in Java with example?

Java hashCode() Java Object hashCode() is a native method and returns the integer hash code value of the object. The general contract of hashCode() method is: If two objects are unequal according to equals() method, their hash code are not required to be different. Their hash code value may or may-not be equal.Click to see full answer. Just so, what is a hashCode in Java?Answer: The hashcode of a Java Object is simply a number, it is 32-bit signed int, that allows an object to be managed by a hash-based data structure. We know that hash code is an unique id number allocated to an object by JVM. If two objects are equals then these two objects should return same hash code.One may also ask, what is the use of hashCode and equals method in Java? 1. Usage of hashCode() and equals() Methods. equals(Object otherObject) – As method name suggests, is used to simply verify the equality of two objects. It’s default implementation simply check the object references of two objects to verify their equality. Accordingly, how is hashCode calculated in Java? Simply put, hashCode() returns an integer value, generated by a hashing algorithm. Objects that are equal (according to their equals()) must return the same hash code. It’s not required for different objects to return different hash codes.What is the purpose of hashCode?The purpose of the hashCode() method is to provide a numeric representation of an object’s contents so as to provide an alternate mechanism to loosely identify it. By default the hashCode() returns an integer that represents the internal memory address of the object.