就我个人而言，我认为StringBuffer在现实世界中没有任何用处。什么时候我想通过操纵字符序列在多个线程之间进行通信?这听起来一点用都没有，但也许我还没有看到光明:)

下面是一个小代码片段，演示了如何在异步环境中破坏StringBuilder

public static void main(String[] args) throws InterruptedException {
    StringBuilder builder = new StringBuilder();

    ExecutorService executorService = Executors.newFixedThreadPool(50);
    for (int i = 0; i < 1000 * 1000; i++) {
        executorService.submit(new AppendRunnable(builder));
    }

    executorService.shutdown();
    executorService.awaitTermination(1, TimeUnit.MINUTES);

    Stream.of(builder.toString().split(System.lineSeparator()))
        .filter(line -> !line.equals("I just appended this!"))
        .forEach(System.out::println);
}

record AppendRunnable(StringBuilder stringBuilder) implements Runnable {

    @Override
    public void run() {
        stringBuilder.append("I just appended this!\n");
    }
}

本质上，我们将字符串附加到构建器中，并期望它们都等于“我刚刚附加了这个!”。但它们不是，其中一些前缀是空字符，因为构建器的内部字符缓冲区没有同步，它被错误地调整了大小。在这种情况下使用StringBuffer可以解决问题。更多详细信息请点击这里

You use String when an immutable structure is appropriate; obtaining a new character sequence from a String may carry an unacceptable performance penalty, either in CPU time or memory (obtaining substrings is CPU efficient because the data is not copied, but this means a potentially much larger amount of data may remain allocated). You use StringBuilder when you need to create a mutable character sequence, usually to concatenate several character sequences together. You use StringBuffer in the same circumstances you would use StringBuilder, but when changes to the underlying string must be synchronized (because several threads are reading/modifyind the string buffer).

这里有一个例子。

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                  String                    StringBuffer         StringBuilder
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------                 
Storage Area | Constant String Pool         Heap                   Heap 
Modifiable   |  No (immutable)              Yes( mutable )         Yes( mutable )
Thread Safe  |      Yes                     Yes                     No
 Performance |     Fast                 Very slow                  Fast
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

另外，StringBuffer是线程安全的，而StringBuilder不是。

因此，在实时情况下，当不同的线程正在访问它时，StringBuilder可能会有一个不确定的结果。

String和其他两个类的区别在于String是不可变的，而其他两个类是可变的。

但是为什么我们有两个相同目的的类呢?

原因是StringBuffer是线程安全的，而StringBuilder不是。 StringBuilder是StringBuffer Api上的一个新类，它是在JDK5中引入的，如果你工作在单线程环境中，总是推荐使用它，因为它要快得多

有关完整的详细信息，请访问http://www.codingeek.com/java/stringbuilder-and-stringbuffer-a-way-to-create-mutable-strings-in-java/