What is a class in Java?

A class is a blueprint or template that defines the state (fields/attributes) and behavior (methods) of objects. It is the fundamental unit of object-oriented programming in Java. A class definition describes what objects of that type will look like and what they can do, but does not itself occupy memory for the instance data. Example: a Car class might have fields like color and speed, and methods like accelerate() and brake(). Every Java program is built from classes, and the main() method inside a class is the entry point of the program.