Difference between Thread and Runnable in Java

There are two ways to create a new thread of execution. One is to declare a class to be a subclass of the Thread class. This subclass should override the run method of the Thread class. An instance of the subclass can then be allocated and started.

The other way to create a thread is to declare a class that implements the Runnable interface. That class then implements the run method. An instance of the class can then be allocated, passed as an argument when creating Thread, and started.

Every thread has a name for identification purposes. More than one thread may have the same name. If a name is not specified when a thread is created, a new name is generated for it.

Example of Runnable

class RunnableExample implements Runnable{
   public void run(){
      System.out.println("Thread is running for Runnable Implementation");
   }
   public static void main(String args[]){
      RunnableExample runnable=new RunnableExample();
      Thread t1 =new Thread(runnable);
      t1.start();
   }
}

Example of Thread

class ThreadExample extends Thread{
   public void run(){
      System.out.println("Thread is running");
   }
   public static void main(String args[]){
      ThreadExample t1=new ThreadExample ();
      t1.start();
   }
}