Maven Lifecycle

 

The Maven Build Lifecycle is a sequence of phases that define the order in which the goals (tasks) are executed to build and manage a project. Maven follows a well-defined standard lifecycle, which simplifies the build process and provides consistency across different projects.

What is a Build Lifecycle?

A build lifecycle is essentially a well-defined sequence of phases that need to be executed to build a project. Each phase represents a stage in the lifecycle.

Maven has three built-in lifecycles:

1. default – handles your project deployment (most commonly used).

2. clean – handles project cleaning (deletes old builds).

3. site – handles the creation of your project’s documentation.

1. Default Lifecycle (Core Build Lifecycle)

This is the main lifecycle and consists of 23 phases, out of which the most commonly used ones are:

Phase	Description
validate	Validates the project is correct and all necessary information is available.
initialize	Initializes build state, sets properties.
generate-sources	Generates any source code needed before compilation.
process-sources	Processes the source code, like filtering.
generate-resources	Generates resources for inclusion in the package.
process-resources	Copies and processes resources (like properties files) to the output directory.
compile	Compiles the source code.
process-classes	Post-processes the compiled classes (e.g., bytecode enhancement).
generate-test-sources	Generates test source code.
process-test-sources	Processes the test source code.
test-compile	Compiles test source code.
process-test-classes	Post-processes compiled test classes.
test	Runs tests using a suitable unit testing framework.
prepare-package	Performs operations before packaging like war/jar customization.
package	Packages the compiled code into a JAR/WAR.
pre-integration-test	Setup steps before running integration tests.
integration-test	Runs integration tests.
post-integration-test	Cleanup after integration tests.
verify	Runs checks to ensure the quality and correctness of the package.
install	Installs the package into the local Maven repository.
deploy	Copies the final package to the remote repository.

2. Clean Lifecycle

Used to clean the project before building. It has 3 phases:

Phase	Description
pre-clean	Executed before the actual project cleaning.
clean	Deletes the target/ directory (build output).
post-clean	Executed after the cleaning is complete.

3. Site Lifecycle

Used to generate documentation for the project. It has 4 phases:

Phase	Description
pre-site	Executed before generating the site.
site	Generates the project documentation.
post-site	Executes operations needed after the site is generated.
site-deploy	Deploys the site to a web server.

Example Command Execution

mvn clean install

Above command will:

• clean: delete the old target/ directory.

• install: run the full default lifecycle (validate → compile → test → package → install).