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What is Method Overloading?

It is a feature that allows a class to have more than one method of the same name, but different parameters. The method can be overloaded if:-

1. No of parameters are different in two methods
2. Type of parameters are different
3. Sequence of parameters are different

Note:- If two methods have same name, same no of parameters, same sequence of parameters and same type of parameters but different return type, then the methods are not overloaded. It will show compile time error.

Why do we need Method Overloading?

If we need to perform the same kind of operation with different data inputs, we go for method overloading. Below is an example of an addition operation with different inputs to explain method overloading. It is an example of static polymorphism early binding or compile time binding. Here, the binding of the method call to its definition happens at compile time.

Below is an example of method overloading.

public class MethodOverloading_Demo {

    public void Calculation(int a, float b) {
        System.out.println("Sum of 2 numbers :" + (a + b));
    }

    //Different type of parameters
    public void Calculation(float x, float y) {
        System.out.println("Sum of 2 numbers :" + (x + y));
    }

    //Different number of parameters
    public void Calculation(int i, int j, int k) {
        System.out.println("Sum of 3 numbers :" + (i + j + k));
    }

    //Different sequence of parameters
    public void Calculation(float p, int r) {
        System.out.println("Sum of 3 numbers :" + (p + r));
    }

    public static void main(String[] args) {

        MethodOverloading_Demo add = new MethodOverloading_Demo();

        //Call overloaded methods
        add.Calculation(5, 12f);
        add.Calculation(13f, 12.0f);
        add.Calculation(22, 33, 50);
        add.Calculation(11f, 10);
    }

}

The output of the above program is

What is Type Promotion?

When a data type of smaller type, promote to bigger type, it called type promotion.  Suppose a method has double data type and object provides float, then the program works fine. Float will be promote to double.

Let us explain this with an example. In the below example, object has provided float data type, but method has double data type, so there is type promotion.

public class Addition {

    public void Calculation(int a, int b)  {
        System.out.println("Sum of 2 numbers :"+(a+b));
    }

    public void Calculation(int x, double y)   {
        System.out.println("Sum of 2 numbers :"+(x+y));
    }

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        Addition add = new Addition();
        //Type Promotion method
        add.Calculation(5,12);
        add.Calculation(13,12f);
    }
}

The output of the above program is

We are done! Congratulations on making it through this tutorial and hope you found it useful! Happy Learning!!