---
title: 'PL/pgSQL Continue Statement'
page_title: 'PL/pgSQL Continue Statement By Examples'
page_description: 'In this tutorial, you will learn about the PL/pgSQL Continue statement to skip the current loop iteration and continue the next one.'
prev_url: 'https://www.postgresqltutorial.com/postgresql-plpgsql/pl-pgsql-continue/'
ogImage: ''
updatedOn: '2024-03-19T04:07:31+00:00'
enableTableOfContents: true
previousLink:
  title: 'PL/pgSQL Exit Statement'
  slug: 'postgresql-plpgsql/plpgsql-exit'
nextLink:
  title: 'PostgreSQL Exception'
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---

**Summary**: in this tutorial, you will learn how to use the PL/pgSQL `continue` statement to control the loop.

## Introduction to PL/pgSQL continue statement

The `continue` statement prematurely skips the current iteration of the loop and starts the next one.

In practice, you can use the `continue` statement within the loops including [unconditional loops,](plpgsql-loop-statements) [while loops](/postgresql/plpgsql-while-loop/), and [for loops](plpgsql-for-loop).

Here’s the syntax of the `continue` statement:

```css
continue [loop_label] [when condition]
```

In this syntax, the `loop_label` and `when condition` are optional.

The `loop_label` is the label of the loop that you want to skip the current iteration. If you omit the `loop_label`, the `continue` statement skips the current iteration of the loop. If you specify a loop label, the `continue` statement skips the current iteration of that loop.

The `condition` is a boolean expression that specifies the condition to skip the current iteration of the loop. If the `condition` is `true`, then the `continue` will skip the current loop iteration.

## PL/pgSQL Continue statement example

The following example uses the `continue` statement in an unconditional loop to print out the odd numbers from 1 to 10:

```sql
do
$$
declare
   counter int = 0;
begin

  loop
     counter = counter + 1;

	 -- exit the loop if counter > 10
	 exit when counter > 10;

	 -- skip the current iteration if counter is an even number
	 continue when mod(counter,2) = 0;

	 -- print out the counter
	 raise notice '%', counter;
  end loop;
end;

$$;
```

Output:

```http
NOTICE:  1
NOTICE:  3
NOTICE:  5
NOTICE:  7
NOTICE:  9
```

How it works.

- First, initialize the `counter` to zero.
- Second, increase the counter by one in each iteration. If the `counter` is greater than 10, then [exit](plpgsql-exit) the loop. If the `counter` is an even number, then skip the current iteration.

The `mod(counter,2)` returns the remainder of the division of the `counter` by two.

If it is zero, then the `counter` is an even number. All the statements between the `continue` statement and `end loop` will be skipped.

## Summary

- Use the `continue` statement to skip the current loop iteration prematurely and start a new one.