diff --git a/R/pkg/DESCRIPTION b/R/pkg/DESCRIPTION
index 3d31be809be6..6a83e00dff79 100644
--- a/R/pkg/DESCRIPTION
+++ b/R/pkg/DESCRIPTION
@@ -13,7 +13,7 @@ Authors@R: c(person("Shivaram", "Venkataraman", role = c("aut", "cre"),
 License: Apache License (== 2.0)
 URL: https://www.apache.org/ https://spark.apache.org/
 BugReports: https://spark.apache.org/contributing.html
-SystemRequirements: Java (== 8)
+SystemRequirements: Java (>= 8)
 Depends:
     R (>= 3.1),
     methods
diff --git a/R/pkg/R/client.R b/R/pkg/R/client.R
index 660f0864403e..3299346bce00 100644
--- a/R/pkg/R/client.R
+++ b/R/pkg/R/client.R
@@ -91,11 +91,17 @@ checkJavaVersion <- function() {
       }, javaVersionOut)
 
   javaVersionStr <- strsplit(javaVersionFilter[[1]], "[\"]")[[1L]][2]
-  # javaVersionStr is of the form 1.8.0_92.
-  # Extract 8 from it to compare to sparkJavaVersion
-  javaVersionNum <- as.integer(strsplit(javaVersionStr, "[.]")[[1L]][2])
-  if (javaVersionNum != sparkJavaVersion) {
-    stop(paste("Java version", sparkJavaVersion, "is required for this package; found version:",
+  # javaVersionStr is of the form 1.8.0_92/9.0.x/11.0.x.
+  # We are using 8, 9, 10, 11 for sparkJavaVersion.
+  versions <- strsplit(javaVersionStr, "[.]")[[1L]]
+  if ("1" == versions[1]) {
+    javaVersionNum <- as.integer(versions[2])
+  } else {
+    javaVersionNum <- as.integer(versions[1])
+  }
+  if (javaVersionNum < sparkJavaVersion) {
+    stop(paste("Java version", sparkJavaVersion,
+               ", or greater, is required for this package; found version:",
                javaVersionStr))
   }
   return(javaVersionNum)