Thread used for Java CompletableFuture composition?

This is intentionally unspecified. In practice, it will be handled by the same code that also handles the chained operations when the variants without the Async suffix are invoked and exhibits similar behavior.

So when we use the following test code

CompletableFuture.supplyAsync(() -> {
    LockSupport.parkNanos(TimeUnit.SECONDS.toNanos(1));
    return "";
}, r -> new Thread(r, "A").start())
.thenAcceptAsync(s -> {}, r -> {
    System.out.println("scheduled by " + Thread.currentThread());
    new Thread(r, "B").start();
});

it will likely print

scheduled by Thread[A,5,main]

as the thread that completed the previous stage was used to schedule the depending action.

However when we use

CompletableFuture<String> first = CompletableFuture.supplyAsync(() -> "",
    r -> new Thread(r, "A").start());
LockSupport.parkNanos(TimeUnit.SECONDS.toNanos(1));
first.thenAcceptAsync(s -> {}, r -> {
    System.out.println("scheduled by " + Thread.currentThread());
    new Thread(r, "B").start();
});

it will likely print

scheduled by Thread[main,5,main]

as by the time the main thread invokes thenAcceptAsync, the first future is already completed and the main thread will schedule the action itself.

But that is not the end of the story. When we use

CompletableFuture<String> first = CompletableFuture.supplyAsync(() -> {
    LockSupport.parkNanos(TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS.toNanos(5));
    return "";
}, r -> new Thread(r, "A").start());

Set<String> s = ConcurrentHashMap.newKeySet();
Runnable submitter = () -> {
    String n = Thread.currentThread().getName();
    do {
        for(int i = 0; i < 1000; i++)
            first.thenAcceptAsync(x -> s.add(n+" "+Thread.currentThread().getName()),
                Runnable::run);
    } while(!first.isDone());
};
Thread b = new Thread(submitter, "B");
Thread c = new Thread(submitter, "C");
b.start();
c.start();
b.join();
c.join();
System.out.println(s);

It may not only print the combinations B A and C A from the first scenario and B B and C C from the second. On my machine it reproducibly also prints the combinations B C and C B indicating that an action passed to thenAcceptAsync by one thread got submitted to the executor by the other thread calling thenAcceptAsync with a different action at the same time.

This is matching the scenarios for the thread evaluating the function passed to thenApply (without the Async) described in this answer. As said at the beginning, that was what I expected as both things are likely handled by the same code. But unlike the thread evaluating the function passed to thenApply, the thread invoking the execute method on the Executor is not even mentioned in the documentation. So in theory, another implementation could use an entirely different thread not calling a method on the future nor completing it.

At the end is a simple program that does like your code snippet and allows you to play with it.

The output confirms that the executor you supply is called to complete (unless you explicitly call complete early enough - which would happen in the calling thread of complete) when the condition it is waiting on is ready - the get() on a Future blocks until the Future is finished.

Supply an arg - there's an executor 1 and executor 2, supply no args there's just one executor. The output is either (same executor - things a run as separate tasks in the same executor sequentially) -

In thread Thread[main,5,main] - getFoo
In thread Thread[main,5,main] - getFooToBar
In thread Thread[pool-1-thread-1,5,main] - Supplying Foo
In thread Thread[pool-1-thread-1,5,main] - fooToBar
In thread Thread[main,5,main] - Completed

OR (two executors - things again run sequentially but using different executors) -

In thread Thread[main,5,main] - getFoo
In thread Thread[main,5,main] - getFooToBar
In thread Thread[pool-1-thread-1,5,main] - Supplying Foo
In thread Thread[pool-2-thread-1,5,main] - fooToBar
In thread Thread[main,5,main] - Completed

Remember: the code with the executors (in this example can start immediately in another thread .. the getFoo was called prior to even getting to setting up the FooToBar).

Code follows -

package your.test;

import java.util.concurrent.CompletableFuture;
import java.util.concurrent.ExecutionException;
import java.util.concurrent.Executor;
import java.util.concurrent.Executors;
import java.util.concurrent.TimeUnit;
import java.util.concurrent.TimeoutException;
import java.util.function.Function;
import java.util.function.Supplier;

public class TestCompletableFuture {
    private static void dumpWhichThread(final String msg) {
        System.err.println("In thread " + Thread.currentThread().toString() + " - " + msg);
    }

    private static final class Foo {
        final int i;
        Foo(int i) {
            this.i = i;
        }
    };
    public static Supplier<Foo> getFoo() {
        dumpWhichThread("getFoo");
        return new Supplier<Foo>() {
            @Override
            public Foo get() {
                dumpWhichThread("Supplying Foo");
                return new Foo(10);
            }

        };
    }

    private static final class Bar {
        final String j;
        public Bar(final String j) {
            this.j = j;
        }
    };
    public static Function<Foo, Bar> getFooToBar() {
        dumpWhichThread("getFooToBar");
        return new Function<Foo, Bar>() {
            @Override
            public Bar apply(Foo t) {
                dumpWhichThread("fooToBar");
                return new Bar("" + t.i);
            }
        };
    }


    public static void main(final String args[]) throws InterruptedException, ExecutionException, TimeoutException {
        final TestCompletableFuture obj = new TestCompletableFuture();
        obj.running(args.length == 0);
    }

    private String running(final boolean sameExecutor) throws InterruptedException, ExecutionException, TimeoutException {
        final Executor executor1 = Executors.newSingleThreadExecutor(); 
        final Executor executor2 = sameExecutor ? executor1 : Executors.newSingleThreadExecutor(); 
        CompletableFuture<Foo> futureFoo = CompletableFuture.supplyAsync(getFoo(), executor1);
        CompletableFuture<Bar> futureBar = futureFoo.thenApplyAsync(getFooToBar(), executor2);
        try {
            // Try putting a complete here before the get ..
            return futureBar.get(50, TimeUnit.SECONDS).j;
        }
        finally {
            dumpWhichThread("Completed");
        }
    }
}

Which thread triggers the Bar stage to progress - in the above - it's executor1. In general the thread completing the future (i.e. giving it a value) is what releases the thing depending on it. If you completed the FutureFoo immediately on the main thread - it would be the one triggering it.

SO you have to be careful with this. If you have "N" things all waiting on the future results - but use only a single threaded executor - then the first one scheduled will block that executor until it completes. You can extrapolate to M threads, N futures - it can decay into "M" locks preventing the rest of things progressing.