Branching statements, also known as jump statements, unconditionally transfer the flow of a program's control from one point to another.

C Programming: Branching (Jump) Statements ⤵️

While conditional statements create potential paths, branching statements (or jump statements) force an immediate transfer of control. They are used to exit loops, skip iterations, and leave functions. The four branching statements in C are break, continue, return, and goto.

1. The break Statement

The break statement immediately terminates the execution of the innermost enclosing loop (for, while, do-while) or switch statement. Control is transferred to the statement immediately following the terminated block.

·         Purpose: To exit a loop early or to prevent "fall-through" in a switch case.

Example

This loop searches for the number 5 in an array. Once it's found, there's no need to keep searching, so break is used to exit the loop.

C

#include <stdio.h>

int main() {

    int numbers[10] = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10};

    int i;

    for (i = 0; i < 10; i++) {

        printf("Checking index %d\n", i);

        if (numbers[i] == 5) {

            printf("Found 5! Exiting loop.\n");

            break; // Terminate the for loop

        }

    }

    // Execution resumes here after the break

    printf("Loop finished. The value of i is: %d\n", i);

    return 0;

}

2. The continue Statement

The continue statement skips the remaining code inside the current iteration of a loop and proceeds directly to the next iteration. It doesn't terminate the loop itself.

·         Purpose: To bypass a part of the loop's body for certain iterations.

Example

This loop prints all odd numbers from 1 to 10 by using continue to skip the printf statement for all even numbers.

C

#include <stdio.h>

int main() {

    int i;

    for (i = 1; i <= 10; i++) {

        // If i is even, skip to the next iteration

        if (i % 2 == 0) {

            continue; // Skip the printf statement below

        }

        printf("%d ", i);

    }

    printf("\n");

    return 0;

}

// Output: 1 3 5 7 9

3. The return Statement

The return statement terminates the execution of the current function and transfers control back to the calling function. It can also optionally pass a value back.

·         Purpose: To exit a function and/or provide a result.

Example

The find_sum function calculates the sum of two integers and uses return to send the result back to main.

C

#include <stdio.h>

// This function returns an integer value

int find_sum(int a, int b) {

    int sum = a + b;

    return sum; // Return the value of 'sum' and exit the function

}

int main() {

    int result;

    result = find_sum(10, 20); // Call the function and store the returned value

    printf("The result is: %d\n", result);

    return 0; // Return 0 from main to indicate success

}

4. The goto Statement

The goto statement provides an unconditional jump to a labeled statement somewhere within the same function. Its use is heavily discouraged in modern programming because it breaks the structured flow of code and can make programs extremely difficult to read and debug (often called "spaghetti code").

·         Purpose: To jump to a specific location within a function.

Example

This example uses goto to jump out of a loop to a cleanup section if a condition is met.

C

#include <stdio.h>

int main() {

    int i = 0;

start_loop: // This is a label

    if (i >= 5) {

        goto end_loop; // Jump to the 'end_loop' label

    }

    printf("%d ", i);

    i++;

    goto start_loop; // Jump back to the start of the "loop"

end_loop: // Another label

    printf("\nLoop finished.\n");

    return 0;

}

Note: The loop in this example can and should be written more clearly using a standard for or while loop. The example only serves to demonstrate the mechanics of goto.