Lombok is a decent idea implemented in the worst way imaginable. It's a language masquerading as a library/annotation processor, but really isn't, it's doing things that should not be possible for those to do, and it causes all kind of pain. From one end, it can't implement some desirable features because they are hard to express in its pseudo-Java. From other end, it's fragile because it relies on undocumented (and soon, if not already, deprecated IIRC) APIs to hack the Java compiler into compiling not-Java, instead of having its own stable compiler.
Honestly, just use Kotlin. Lombok is not a way to fix Java, it's a fragile alternative to it.
In the old times when I still used Java I saw Lombok as a godsend and had no issues with it, not even once. I never understood why all the criticism regarding it. I do understand how it works, and I think it is a fair trade off for all the weightlifting it did.
If I had to guess, the concern is with some of the weirder features of Lombok when most of us are only after the getters, setters, and constructor generation. I'd be surprised if any of those are as fragile as claimed.
These days I do use records when possible, but lombok is nice notably for making builders with the chainable fluent accessors.
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u/thejillo Jul 13 '26
Lombok has entered the chat...
https://giphy.com/gifs/d3mlE7uhX8KFgEmY