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8.8: Chained Conditionals

  • Page ID
    103124
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    Sometimes there are more than two possibilities and we need more than two branches. One way to express a computation like that is a chained conditional:

    if x < y:
        print('x is less than y')
    elif x > y:
        print('x is greater than y')
    else:
        print('x and y are equal')

    elif is an abbreviation of "else if." Again, exactly one branch will be executed.

    If-Then-ElseIf Logic

    If-Then-ElseIf Logic

    There is no limit on the number of elif statements. If there is an else clause, it has to be at the end, but there doesn't have to be one.

    Code 3.5.1 (Python)
    choice = input()
    if choice == 'a':
        print('Bad guess')
    elif choice == 'b':
        print('Good guess')
    elif choice == 'c':
        print('Close, but not correct')
    
    print (' Done!')
    

    Each condition is checked in order. If the first is false, the next is checked, and so on. If one of them is true, the corresponding branch executes, and the statement ends. Even if more than one condition is true, only the first true branch executes.


    This page titled 8.8: Chained Conditionals is shared under a CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Chuck Severance via source content that was edited to the style and standards of the LibreTexts platform.