How do I check if a file exists in Java?

Question

How can I check whether a file exists, before opening it for reading in Java (the equivalent of Perl's -e $filename)?

The only similar question on SO deals with writing the file and was thus answered using FileWriter which is obviously not applicable here.

If possible I'd prefer a real API call returning true/false as opposed to some "Call API to open a file and catch when it throws an exception which you check for 'no file' in the text", but I can live with the latter.

Answer 1

Using java.io.File:

File f = new File(filePathString); if(f.exists() && !f.isDirectory()) {      // do something } 

Answer 2

I would recommend using isFile() instead of exists(). Most of the time you are looking to check if the path points to a file not only that it exists. Remember that exists() will return true if your path points to a directory.

new File("path/to/file.txt").isFile(); 

new File("C:/").exists() will return true but will not allow you to open and read from it as a file.