Go nil value

In Go, nil is the zero value for pointers, interfaces, maps, slices, channels and function types, representing an uninitialized value.

nil doesn't mean some "undefined" state, it's a proper value in itself. An object in Go is nil simply if and only if it's value is nil, which it can only be if it's of one of the aforementioned types.

An error is an interface, so nil is a valid value for one, unlike for a string. For obvious reasons a nil error represents no error.

Example of nil in Go

package main

import "fmt"

func main() {
	fmt.Println("nill is", nil)
	nil := 123
	fmt.Println("nill is", nil)
}

Output

nill is
nill is 123

Conclusion

In this page (written and validated by A. Gawali) you learned about Go nil value . What's Next? If you are interested in completing Go tutorial, your next topic will be learning about: Go Type casting - conversion.

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