Reading and writing files in Java is commonly done using classes from the java.io package, such as FileReader, BufferedReader, FileWriter, and BufferedWriter. To read a file, you can use a FileReader wrapped in a BufferedReader for efficient reading, especially for large files. The BufferedReader reads text line by line. For writing files, you use FileWriter, which can also be wrapped in a BufferedWriter for efficient output, allowing you to write text to files with ease. Java also provides Scanner for reading from files and PrintWriter for writing. These operations may involve handling exceptions such as IOException, making error management an essential part of file handling.