Java thread dump: Difference between “waiting to lock” and “parking to wait for”?

You will get “waiting to lock” in the thread dump when using intrinsic locks and “parking to wait for” when using locks from java.util.concurrent. Consider the following example:

import java.util.concurrent.locks.Lock;
import java.util.concurrent.locks.ReentrantLock;

public class LockTest {

    final Lock lock = new ReentrantLock(true);

    synchronized void intrinsicLock() {
        Thread th = new Thread(new Runnable() {
            public void run() {
                intrinsicLock();
            }
        }, "My thread");
        th.start();
        try {
            th.join();
        } catch (InterruptedException e) {
        }
    }

    void reentrantLock() {
        lock.lock();
        Thread th = new Thread(new Runnable() {
            public void run() {
                reentrantLock();
            }
        }, "My thread");
        th.start();
        try {
            th.join();
        } catch (InterruptedException e) {
        }
        lock.unlock();
    }


    public static void main(String[] args) {
        LockTest lockTest = new LockTest();
        lockTest.intrinsicLock();
        //lockTest.reentrantLock();
    }

}

With lockTest.intrinsicLock() you will get the following thread dump:

"My thread" prio=10 tid=0x00007fffec015800 nid=0x1775 waiting for monitor entry [0x00007ffff15e5000]
   java.lang.Thread.State: BLOCKED (on object monitor)
    at LockTest.intrinsicLock(LockTest.java:9)
    - waiting to lock <0x00000007d6a33b10> (a LockTest)
    at LockTest$1.run(LockTest.java:11)
    at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:662)

while lockTest.reentrantLock() produce:

"My thread" prio=10 tid=0x00007fffec082800 nid=0x17e8 waiting on condition [0x00007ffff14eb000]
   java.lang.Thread.State: WAITING (parking)
    at sun.misc.Unsafe.park(Native Method)
    - parking to wait for  <0x00000007d6a33d30> (a java.util.concurrent.locks.ReentrantLock$FairSync)
    at java.util.concurrent.locks.LockSupport.park(LockSupport.java:156)
    at java.util.concurrent.locks.AbstractQueuedSynchronizer.parkAndCheckInterrupt(AbstractQueuedSynchronizer.java:811)
    at java.util.concurrent.locks.AbstractQueuedSynchronizer.acquireQueued(AbstractQueuedSynchronizer.java:842)
    at java.util.concurrent.locks.AbstractQueuedSynchronizer.acquire(AbstractQueuedSynchronizer.java:1178)
    at java.util.concurrent.locks.ReentrantLock$FairSync.lock(ReentrantLock.java:201)
    at java.util.concurrent.locks.ReentrantLock.lock(ReentrantLock.java:262)
    at LockTest.reentrantLock(LockTest.java:22)
    at LockTest$2.run(LockTest.java:25)
    at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:662)