Java continue Statement

While working with loops, sometimes you might want to skip some statements or terminate the loop. In such cases, break and continue statements are used.

To learn about the break statement, visit Java break. Here, we will learn about the continue statement.

Java continue

The continue statement skips the current iteration of a loop (for, while, do…while, etc).

After the continue statement, the program moves to the end of the loop. And, test expression is evaluated (update statement is evaluated in case of the for loop).

Here’s the syntax of the continue statement.

continue;

Note: The continue statement is almost always used in decision-making statements (if…else Statement).

Working of Java continue statement

The working of continue statement with Java while, do…while, and for loop. Working of Java continue Statement

Example 1: Java continue statement

class Main {
  public static void main(String[] args) {

    // for loop
    for (int i = 1; i <= 10; ++i) {

      // if value of i is between 4 and 9
      // continue is executed
      if (i > 4 && i < 9) {
        continue;
      }
      System.out.println(i);
    }
  }
}

Output:

1
2
3
4
9
10

In the above program, we are using the for loop to print the value of i in each iteration. To know how for loop works, visit Java for loop. Notice the statement,

if (i > 4 && i < 9) {
    continue;
}

Here, the continue statement is executed when the value of i becomes more than 4 and less than 9.

It then skips the print statement for those values. Hence, the output skips the values 5, 6, 7, and 8.

Example 2: Compute the sum of 5 positive numbers

import java.util.Scanner;

class Main {
  public static void main(String[] args) {

    Double number, sum = 0.0;
    // create an object of Scanner
    Scanner input = new Scanner(System.in);

    for (int i = 1; i < 6; ++i) {
      System.out.print("Enter number " + i + " : ");
      // takes input from the user
      number = input.nextDouble();

      // if number is negative
      // continue statement is executed
      if (number <= 0.0) {
        continue;
      }

      sum += number;
    }
    System.out.println("Sum = " + sum);
    input.close();
  }
}

Output:

Enter number 1: 2.2
Enter number 2: 5.6
Enter number 3: 0
Enter number 4: -2.4
Enter number 5: -3
Sum = 7.8

In the above example, we have used the for loop to print the sum of 5 positive numbers. Notice the line,

if (number < 0.0) {
    continue;
}

Here, when the user enters a negative number, the continue statement is executed. This skips the current iteration of the loop and takes the program control to the update expression of the loop.

Note: To take input from the user, we have used the Scanner object. To learn more, visit Java Scanner.