Exit a while loop in VBS/VBA

Question

Is there a method of exiting/breaking a while in VBS/VBA?

Following code won't work as intended:

num = 0
while (num < 10)

    if (status = "Fail") then
        exit while
    end if

    num = num+1
wend

Answer 1

VBScript's While loops don't support early exit. Use the Do loop for that:

num = 0
do while (num < 10)
  if (status = "Fail") then exit do
  num = num + 1
loop

Answer 2

what about changing the while loop to a do while loop

and exit using

Exit Do

Answer 3

While Loop is an obsolete structure, I would recommend you to replace "While loop" to "Do While..loop", and you will able to use Exit clause.

check = 0 

Do while not rs.EOF 
   if rs("reg_code") = rcode then 
      check = 1 
      Response.Write ("Found") 
      Exit do
   else 
      rs.MoveNext 
    end if 
Loop 

if check = 0 then 
   Response.Write "Not Found" 
end if}

Answer 4

Incredibly old question, but bearing in mind that the OP said he does not want to use Do While and that none of the other solutions really work... Here's something that does exactly the same as a Exit Loop:

This never runs anything if the status is already at "Fail"...

While (i < 20 And Not bShouldStop)
    If (Status = "Fail") Then
        bShouldStop = True
    Else
        i = i + 1
        '
        ' Do Something
        '
    End If  
Wend

Whereas this one always processes something first (and increment the loop variable) before deciding whether it should loop once more or not.

While (i < 20 And Not bShouldStop)
    i = i + 1
    '
    ' Do Something
    '

    If (Status = "Fail") Then
        bShouldStop = True
    End If  
Wend

Ultimately, if the variable Status is being modified inside the While (and assuming you don't need i outside the while, it makes no difference really, but just wanted to present multiple options...

Answer 5

I know this is old as dirt but it ranked pretty high in google.

The problem with the solution maddy implemented (in response to rahul) to maintain the use of a While...Wend loop has some drawbacks

In the example given

num = 0
While num < 10
  If status = "Fail" Then
    num = 10
  End If
  num = num + 1
Wend

After status = "Fail" num will actually equal 11. The loop didn't end on the fail condition, it ends on the next test. All of the code after the check still processed and your counter is not what you might have expected it to be.

Now depending on what you are all doing in your loop it may not matter, but then again if your code looked something more like:

num = 0
While num < 10
  If folder = "System32" Then
    num = 10
  End If
  RecursiveDeleteFunction folder
  num = num + 1
Wend

Using Do While or Do Until allows you to stop execution of the loop using Exit Do instead of using trickery with your loop condition to maintain the While ... Wend syntax. I would recommend using that instead.

Answer 6

While many have mentioned Do While...Loop, there are no examples showing the While is not necessary:

count = 0
Do
    count = count + 1
    wscript.echo count
    
    If (count > 9) Then
        Exit Do
    End If
    
    '...Some other logic that can be ended early...

    wscript.sleep(1000)
Loop

If you already have the variable to compare against and it makes sense to complete the loop, Do While... is great. However, if you're doing something a little more granular, like the WScript.Sleep above that delays the script can be avoided.

Answer 7

Use Do...Loop with Until keyword

num=0
Do Until //certain_condition_to_break_loop
 num=num+1
Loop

This loop will continue to execute, Until the condition becomes true

While...Wend is the old syntax and does not provide feature to break loop! Prefer do while loops