Note: Oracle Java 8/9/10 is no longer available for public download (license change).

First install and update brew from Terminal:

bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/HEAD/install.sh)"

brew tap homebrew/cask-versions

brew update

NEW as of June 2019

To install the JDKs from AdoptOpenJDK:

brew tap adoptopenjdk/openjdk

brew install --cask adoptopenjdk8
brew install --cask adoptopenjdk9
brew install --cask adoptopenjdk10
brew install --cask adoptopenjdk11

OLD

Java 8:

brew install --cask java8

Java Latest:

brew install --cask java

Rosetta 2

You can run Java for Intel Macs on Apple Silicon (ARM, Aarch64) via Rosetta 2.

Choice of JDK vendors

But for maximum performance, obtain an implementation of Java 8 built for Apple Silicon Macs.

Arm64 jdk-8 is currently unavailable currently.

Not true.

You have a choice of JDK vendors.

I know Azul Systems provides JDK products for Java 8 on both Mac’s with Intel and Macs with Apple Silicon M1/M2/M3.

Try these vendors providing JDK products, to see if they offer Java 8 on Apple Silicon Macs:

• Adoptium
• Azul Systems
• Microsoft
• Amazon
• SAP
• BellSoft
• Oracle
• IBM
• Red Hat
• … and more

SDKMAN!

I enjoy using the console app SDKMAN! to easily find, download, install, and uninstall JDKs from a subset of the vendors listed above.

Works with simple command-line instructions such as:

Copysdk list java 

… and:

Copysdk install java specific_product_identifier_pasted_here

Yes.

On this page: AdoptOpenJDK Latest Releases you can select 'macOS' from the 'Operating System' dropdown, and then from 'Architecture', it's currently only x64, but soonish there should be AArch64 or ARM64 (those are usually the shortcodes for 64-bit ARM). Possibly, as Apple no doubt has a bunch of extensions built into their M1 designs, and Apple gets its own.

If you instead leave Operation System on 'any', you'll note aarch64 is in there, and this gets you to a Linux release for ARM processors. That (probably) won't run on macOS on M1 hardware, but that's 95% of the work already done.

So: It's not there yet, but note that JDKs for ARM have been available for more than decade, and whilst JDK 15 has dropped support for a bunch of exotic OS/architecture combinations (such as Solaris), ARM development has always remained at least partially relevant (even if so far it's mostly an Oracle commercial license offering). That is to say: It should not be a herculean effort to create an adoptopenjdk release that runs on M1s natively, so presumably, it will happen. But, it's an open source effort, so if you're anxious, by all means, read up and contribute :)

Apple has not given any details on this architecture whatsoever until November 10th 2020, unless you bought a development kit box for it (a Mac Mini with an A14 chip, which isn't an M1 chip, but close enough I guess), and signed a big NDA.

As a rule, open source projects will run as fast as possible in the opposite direction if you wave an NDA around, so if you dislike this state of affairs, I don't think it's wise to complain to adoptopenjdk or other packagers and open source projects about it :)

Fortunately, now it's out, and an NDA is no longer required. My assumption is that the ARM branch of the OpenJDK source code + the macOS bits that already exist for the macOS x64 release can be combined rather easily once someone with some familiarity with the OpenJDK source code has an M1-based macOS system to test it on, which should mean an adoptopenjdk macos-aarch64 release should be here within the month.

But, open source. You didn't pay them, you have no contract, and they don't owe it to you. Donate to the effort or contribute a pull request if you want it to go faster.

UPDATE:

• Azul's M1 OpenJDK builds
• Microsoft's (yes, really) GitHub source repo for an early access OpenJDK16 build for macOS on AArch64. Note that Microsoft's been working on the OpenJDK branch of AArch64 (for ARM-based Windows 10) for a while, which goes back to: A lot of the hard work was already done.