The this keyword is a reference to the current object.

class Foo
{
    private int bar;

    public Foo(int bar)
    {
        // the "this" keyword allows you to specify that
        // you mean "this type" and reference the members
        // of this type - in this instance it is allowing
        // you to disambiguate between the private member
        // "bar" and the parameter "bar" passed into the
        // constructor
        this.bar = bar;
    }
}

Another way to think about it is that the this keyword is like a personal pronoun that you use to reference yourself. Other languages have different words for the same concept. VB uses Me and the Python convention (as Python does not use a keyword, simply an implicit parameter to each method) is to use self.

If you were to reference objects that are intrinsically yours you would say something like this:

My arm or my leg

Think of this as just a way for a type to say "my". So a psuedocode representation would look like this:

class Foo
{
    private int bar;

    public Foo(int bar)
    {
        my.bar = bar;
    }
}

this refers to the current object.

Each non-static method runs in the context of an object. So if you have a class like this:

public class MyThisTest {
  private int a;

  public MyThisTest() {
    this(42); // calls the other constructor
  }

  public MyThisTest(int a) {
    this.a = a; // assigns the value of the parameter a to the field of the same name
  }

  public void frobnicate() {
    int a = 1;

    System.out.println(a); // refers to the local variable a
    System.out.println(this.a); // refers to the field a
    System.out.println(this); // refers to this entire object
  }

  public String toString() {
    return "MyThisTest a=" + a; // refers to the field a
  }
}

Then calling frobnicate() on new MyThisTest() will print

1
42
MyThisTest a=42

So effectively you use it for multiple things:

• clarify that you are talking about a field, when there's also something else with the same name as a field
• refer to the current object as a whole
• invoke other constructors of the current class in your constructor

In most IDEs, you can simply mouseover the variable if you want to know. In addition, really, if you're working in an instance method, you should really know all the variables involved. If you have too many, or their names clash, then you need to refactor.

It's really quite redundant.

The this keyword is primarily used in three situations. The first and most common is in setter methods to disambiguate variable references. The second is when there is a need to pass the current class instance as an argument to a method of another object. The third is as a way to call alternate constructors from within a constructor.

Case 1: Using this to disambiguate variable references. In Java setter methods, we commonly pass in an argument with the same name as the private member variable we are attempting to set. We then assign the argument x to this.x. This makes it clear that you are assigning the value of the parameter "name" to the instance variable "name".

public class Foo
{
    private String name;

    public void setName(String name) {
        this.name = name;
    }
}

Case 2: Using this as an argument passed to another object.

public class Foo
{
    public String useBarMethod() {
        Bar theBar = new Bar();
        return theBar.barMethod(this);
    }

    public String getName() {
        return "Foo";
    }
}

public class Bar
{
    public void barMethod(Foo obj) {
        obj.getName();
    }
}

Case 3: Using this to call alternate constructors. In the comments, trinithis correctly pointed out another common use of this. When you have multiple constructors for a single class, you can use this(arg0, arg1, ...) to call another constructor of your choosing, provided you do so in the first line of your constructor.

class Foo
{
    public Foo() {
        this("Some default value for bar");

        //optional other lines
    }

    public Foo(String bar) {
        // Do something with bar
    }
}

I have also seen this used to emphasize the fact that an instance variable is being referenced (sans the need for disambiguation), but that is a rare case in my opinion.