Final node

How to read it

UML 2.5.1 draws an activity final node as a solid circle within a hollow circle, and likens it to a bull's-eye or a target. When the flow reaches it, the whole activity stops: every other flow still running in the activity ends too. An activity may have several; the first one reached ends the activity. Scott Ambler, in The Object Primer, notes that an activity diagram can have zero or more of them. In a state machine diagram a circle surrounding a small filled circle is a final state, meaning that the region it sits in has completed.

Also searched as: activity final, end node, final node symbol, final state, uml final node.

The circle with an X

A circle with an X inside is a different end, the flow final node. It ends only the flow that reaches it, and the activity's other flows carry on. In a state machine diagram, a cross on its own, with no circle, is a terminate pseudostate.

Notes that swap the two

The University of Pretoria's 2015 course notes describe the flow final node as ending all flows in the activity and the activity final node as ending a single flow. UML 2.5.1 says the reverse: the bull's-eye stops all flows, and the circle with the X stops one.

Look-alikes

Without the ring, the filled dot alone is the Initial node, the start.