**Concatenation** is the process of combining two or more strings to form a new string by subsequently appending the next string to the end of the previous strings. 

In Java, two strings can be concatenated by using the **`+`** or **`+=` operator**, or through the **`concat()` method**, defined in the `java.lang.String` class. 

This shot will discuss how to perform string concatenation using both of these methods.

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### Code
###
#### Example 1

The program below demonstrates how to concatenate two strings using the `+` operator in Java.

class HelloWorld {
    public static void main( String args[] ) {
        String first = "Hello"; 
        String second = "World";

        String third = first + second;
        System.out.println(third);

        // yet another way to concatenate strings
        first += second;
        System.out.println(first);        
    }
}

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### The `concat()` method

The signature of the `concat()` method is shown below: 

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### Syntax
---
``` Java
String concat(String stringToConcat)
```
---

##
### Parameter
**`stringToConcat`** is the string to be concatenated. It will be appended at the end of the string object calling this method. 

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### Return type
The `concat()` method returns the concatenated string.

###
#### Example 2

The program below demonstrates the concatenation using the `String.concat()` method with two strings in Java:

class HelloWorld {
    public static void main( String args[] ) {
        String first = "Hello"; 
        String second = "World";

        String third = first.concat(second); 
        System.out.println(third);
    }
}

> **Note:** You can also directly concatenate the strings within the `println` method itself as `System.out.println(first + second);` or `System.out.println(first.concat(second));`.

How to concatenate strings in Java

Code

Example 1

The concat() method

Syntax

Parameter

Return type

Example 2

The `concat()` method