- Launch NetBeans IDE and choose Tools > Plugins from the main menu. The Plugins Manager opens in a new window.
- Select the Available Plugins tab at the top of the Manager, then in the Search text field located in the upper right corner, type in maven. The Search field serves as a filter, eliminating all plugin entries that do not contain the entered characters.
- You should see the Maven plugin entry as the only one remaining. Important: Please check that the version of the Maven plugin you are installing is 3.1 and greater (Netbeans 6.5: In 6.5, the version should state 4.0.5 and above).
Click Install.
- The NetBeans IDE Installer opens, listing the Maven plugins that are about to be installed.
Click Next.
- Accept the license agreement that displays, and the Installer automatically begins downloading and validating the modules for installation.
- When the modules are successfully installed into the IDE.
Click Finish.
The module installation contains an embedded version of Maven for building in the IDE, however it's highly recommended that you use command line Maven for building. The embedded version is not 100% compatible with the latest stable release of Maven. Please refer to Maven website for the latest binaries.
NetBeans 6.5, NetBeans 6.7: The IDE will try to find your Maven binary on PATH or use the installation set in IDE's options. Only if none are found, it falls back to the embedded version with a warning in build output.