title: Error: A JNI error has occurred, please check your installation and try again in IntelliJ IDEA
body: <p>I wrote a simple project in Java, using default configuration in IntelliJ IDEA. I built the project and ran it successfully. I was using Java 1.9. I wanted to check if it runs with Java 1.8. I changed the JRE in the configuration from Java 1.9 to Java 1.8 and ran my project. The following error occurred:</p>
  
  <pre><code>Error: A JNI error has occurred, please check your installation and try again
  Exception in thread "main" java.lang.UnsupportedClassVersionError: Main has been compiled by a more recent version of the Java Runtime (class file version 53.0), this version of the Java Runtime only recognizes class file versions up to 52.0
      at java.lang.ClassLoader.defineClass1(Native Method)
      at java.lang.ClassLoader.defineClass(ClassLoader.java:763)
      at java.security.SecureClassLoader.defineClass(SecureClassLoader.java:142)
      at java.net.URLClassLoader.defineClass(URLClassLoader.java:467)
      at java.net.URLClassLoader.access$100(URLClassLoader.java:73)
      at java.net.URLClassLoader$1.run(URLClassLoader.java:368)
      at java.net.URLClassLoader$1.run(URLClassLoader.java:362)
      at java.security.AccessController.doPrivileged(Native Method)
      at java.net.URLClassLoader.findClass(URLClassLoader.java:361)
      at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:424)
      at sun.misc.Launcher$AppClassLoader.loadClass(Launcher.java:349)
      at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:357)
      at sun.launcher.LauncherHelper.checkAndLoadMain(LauncherHelper.java:495)
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>This question: <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/43034197/intellij-error-a-jni-error-has-occurred-please-check-your-installation-and-try">IntelliJ Error: A JNI error has occurred, please check your installation and try again</a> is different because it has <code>NoClassDefFoundError</code> instead of <code>UnsupportedClassVersionError</code>. This question <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/22381202/a-jni-error-has-occurred-please-check-your-installation-and-try-again-in-eclips">A JNI error has occurred, please check your installation and try again in Eclipse x86 Windows 8.1</a> is also different because it regards Eclipse, not IntelliJ IDEA.</p>