Statement (programming)

A statement is the minimal unit of structuring in imperative programming languages.

The following are the major generic kinds of statements with examples in Pascal, a typical imperative language:

• definition: TYPE SALARY = INTEGER
• declaration: VAR A:INTEGER
• assignment: A := A + 1
• sequence: A := A + 1; WRITELN(A)
• conditional: IF A > 3 THEN WRITELN(A) ELSE WRITELN("NOT YET") END
• loop: FOR A:=1 TO 10 DO WRITELN(A) END
• call: CLEARSCREEN()

Statements contrast with expressions in that the former do not return results and are executed solely for their side effects, while the latter always return a result and often do not have side effects at all.

In block-structured programming languages, statements are grouped into statement blocks.