no-unnecessary-condition
Prevents conditionals where the type is always truthy or always falsy.
Any expression being used as a condition must be able to evaluate as truthy or falsy in order to be considered "necessary". Conversely, any expression that always evaluates to truthy or always evaluates to falsy, as determined by the type of the expression, is considered unnecessary and will be flagged by this rule.
The following expressions are checked:
- Arguments to the
&&
,||
and?:
(ternary) operators - Conditions for
if
,for
,while
, anddo-while
statements - Base values of optional chain expressions
Rule Details
Examples of code for this rule:
- ❌ Incorrect
- ✅ Correct
function head<T>(items: T[]) {
// items can never be nullable, so this is unnecessary
if (items) {
return items[0].toUpperCase();
}
}
function foo(arg: 'bar' | 'baz') {
// arg is never nullable or empty string, so this is unnecessary
if (arg) {
}
}
function bar<T>(arg: string) {
// arg can never be nullish, so ?. is unnecessary
return arg?.length;
}
// Checks array predicate return types, where possible
[
[1, 2],
[3, 4],
].filter(t => t); // number[] is always truthy
function head<T>(items: T[]) {
// Necessary, since items.length might be 0
if (items.length) {
return items[0].toUpperCase();
}
}
function foo(arg: string) {
// Necessary, since foo might be ''.
if (arg) {
}
}
function bar(arg?: string | null) {
// Necessary, since arg might be nullish
return arg?.length;
}
[0, 1, 2, 3].filter(t => t); // number can be truthy or falsy
Options
type Options = {
// if true, the rule will ignore constant loop conditions
allowConstantLoopConditions?: boolean;
// if true, the rule will not error when running with a tsconfig that has strictNullChecks turned **off**
allowRuleToRunWithoutStrictNullChecksIKnowWhatIAmDoing?: boolean;
};
const defaultOptions: Options = {
allowConstantLoopConditions: false,
allowRuleToRunWithoutStrictNullChecksIKnowWhatIAmDoing: false,
};
allowConstantLoopConditions
Example of correct code for { allowConstantLoopConditions: true }
:
while (true) {}
for (; true; ) {}
do {} while (true);
allowRuleToRunWithoutStrictNullChecksIKnowWhatIAmDoing
If this is set to false
, then the rule will error on every file whose tsconfig.json
does not have the strictNullChecks
compiler option (or strict
) set to true
.
Without strictNullChecks
, TypeScript essentially erases undefined
and null
from the types. This means when this rule inspects the types from a variable, it will not be able to tell that the variable might be null
or undefined
, which essentially makes this rule useless.
You should be using strictNullChecks
to ensure complete type-safety in your codebase.
If for some reason you cannot turn on strictNullChecks
, but still want to use this rule - you can use this option to allow it - but know that the behavior of this rule is undefined with the compiler option turned off. We will not accept bug reports if you are using this option.
When Not To Use It
The main downside to using this rule is the need for type information.
Related To
- ESLint: no-constant-condition -
no-unnecessary-condition
is essentially a stronger version ofno-constant-condition
, but requires type information. - strict-boolean-expressions - a more opinionated version of
no-unnecessary-condition
.strict-boolean-expressions
enforces a specific code style, whileno-unnecessary-condition
is about correctness.
Attributes
- ✅ Recommended
- 🔧 Fixable
- 💭 Requires type information