When to use LinkedList over ArrayList? I've always been one to simply use: List<String> names = new ArrayList<String>(); I use the interface as the type name for portability, so that when I ask questions such as these I can rework my code. When should LinkedList be used over ArrayList and vice-versa? Answer: TL;DR ArrayList with ArrayDeque are preferable in much more use-cases than LinkedList. Not sure — just start with ArrayList. LinkedList and ArrayList are two different implementations of the List interface. LinkedListimplements it with a doubly-linked list. ArrayList implements it with a dynamically re-sizing array. As with standard linked list and array