continue statement (C)

The continue statement passes control to the next iteration of the nearest enclosing do, for, or while statement in which it appears, bypassing any remaining statements in the do, for, or while statement body.

Syntax

jump-statement:
continue ;

The next iteration of a do, for, or while statement is determined as follows:

  • Within a do or a while statement, the next iteration starts by reevaluating the expression of the do or while statement.

  • A continue statement in a for statement causes evaluation of the loop expression of the for statement. Then the code reevaluates the conditional expression. Depending on the result, it either terminates or iterates the statement body. For more information on the for statement and its nonterminals, see The for statement.

Here's an example of the continue statement:

while ( i-- > 0 )
{
    x = f( i );
    if ( x == 1 )
        continue;
    y += x * x;
}

In this example, the statement body is executed while i is greater than 0. First f(i) is assigned to x; then, if x is equal to 1, the continue statement is executed. The rest of the statements in the body get ignored. Execution resumes at the top of the loop with the evaluation of the loop's test.

See also

continue statement (C++)