# Language Reference - Conditional Statements

You will often want to change the flow of your script based on a condition or series of conditions. Is one number bigger than another? Or, does a string contain a certain value?

Conditions are evaluated as true (non-zero) or false (zero). Conditions generally use comparison operators like ==, <>, >=.

The following conditional statements are available in AutoIt:

- If...Then...Else
- Select...Case
- Switch...Case

Both statements are similar and decide which code to execute depending on the condition given. Here is an example of an If statement that pops up a message box if a variable is greater than 10.

$var = 20
If $var > 10 Then
MsgBox(0, "Example", "$var was greater than 10!")
Else
MsgBox(0, "Example", "$var was less than 10")
EndIf

In the example above the expression $var > 10 evaluated to true because the variable was indeed greater than 10. This caused the If statement to execute the first MsgBox line and display "$var was greater than 10!".

A Select statement is very similar, but is generally used for situations where you want to test a large number of conditions as it is generally easier to read than than large If/ElseIf type block. e.g.

$var = 30
Select
Case $var > 1 AND $var <= 10
MsgBox(0, "Example", "$var was greater than 1")
Case $var > 10 AND $var <= 20
MsgBox(0, "Example", "$var was greater than 10")
Case $var > 20 AND $var <= 30
MsgBox(0, "Example", "$var was greater than 20")
Case $var > 30 AND $var <= 40
MsgBox(0, "Example", "$var was greater than 30")
Case $var > 40
MsgBox(0, "Example", "$var was greater than 40")
EndSelect

A Switch statement is very similar to Select statement, but is generally used for situations where the same expression is tested against some different possible values.

$var = 30
Switch Int($var)
Case 1 To 10
MsgBox(0, "Example", "$var was greater than 1")
Case 11 To 20
MsgBox(0, "Example", "$var was greater than 10")
Case 21 To 30
MsgBox(0, "Example", "$var was greater than 20")
Case 31 To 40
MsgBox(0, "Example", "$var was greater than 30")
Else Case
MsgBox(0, "Example", "$var was greater than 40 or less r equal to 0")
EndSwitch