C Break and Continue
Break
You have already seen the break statement used in an earlier chapter of this tutorial. It was used to "jump out" of a switch statement.
The break statement can also be used to jump out of a
loop.
This example stops the loop when i is equal to 4:
Example
int i;
for (i = 0; i < 10; i++) {
if (i == 4) {
break;
}
printf("%d\n", i);
}Continue
The continue statement breaks one iteration (in the loop), if a specified condition occurs, and continues with the next iteration in the loop.
This example skips the value of 4:
Example
int i;
for (i = 0; i < 10; i++) {
if (i == 4) {
continue;
}
printf("%d\n", i);
}Good to Remember:
break= stop the loop completely.continue= skip this round, but keep looping.
Combining Break and Continue
You can also combine break and continue.
This example skips printing 2 and stops the loop at 4:
Example
int i;
for (i = 0; i < 6; i++) {
if (i == 2) {
continue;
}
if (i == 4) {
break;
}
printf("%d\n", i);
}Break and Continue in While Loop
You can also use break and continue in while loops:
Break Example
int i = 0;
while (i < 10) {
if (i == 4) {
break;
}
printf("%d\n", i);
i++;
}Continue Example
int i = 0;
while (i < 10) {
if (i == 4) {
i++;
continue;
}
printf("%d\n", i);
i++;
}Real-Life Example
Imagine processing a list of numbers where you want to skip negative values, but stop completely if you find a zero:
Example
int myNumbers[] = {3, -1, 7, 0, 9};
int length = sizeof(myNumbers) / sizeof(myNumbers[0]);
int i;
for (i = 0; i < length; i++) {
if (myNumbers[i] < 0) {
continue; // skip negative numbers
}
if (myNumbers[i] == 0) {
break; // stop loop when zero is found
}
printf("%d\n", myNumbers[i]);
}Note: Don't worry if you don't fully understand the example above.
It uses an array (int numbers[] = {3, -1, 7, 0, 9};) to store the numbers,
and you will learn more about arrays in the next chapter.
