An Optional in Java is just another value, and nothing in practice stops that from being null. I.e. a method that returns an Optional can still return an actual null if poorly implemented. So the major benefit Optionals give you in Java is a typed declaration that the method may return an "empty" value, which is certainly helpful for knowing what cases your client code needs to handle, but it does not guarantee that the method will never return null. It reduces the probability of unhandled null pointers, but it does not eliminate them.
On the other hand, Swift & co. guarantee at compile time that a function which says it returns an Optional will always return an an Optional, never a null, and, better still, if a function says it returns some non-optional value, it still is guaranteed to never return null.
It's great that Java is pushing for this style of code, but I'm afraid without compile-time guarantees of return values it will always feel less powerful there.
