How to use switch statement inside a React component?

I have a React component, and inside the render method of the component I have something like this:

render() {
    return (
        <div>
            <div>
                // removed for brevity
            </div>

           { switch(...) {} }

            <div>
                // removed for brevity
            </div>
        </div>
    );
}

Now the point is that I have two div elements, one at the top and one at the bottom, that are fixed. In the middle I want to have a switch statement, and according to a value in my state I want to render a different component. So basically, I want the two div elements to be fixed always, and just in the middle to render a different component each time. I'm using this to implement a multi-step payment procedure). Though, as is the code currently it doesn't work, as it gives me an error saying that switch is unexpected. Any ideas how to achieve what I want?


Try this, which is way cleaner too: Get that switch out of the render in a function and just call it passing the params you want. For example:

renderSwitch(param) {
  switch(param) {
    case 'foo':
      return 'bar';
    default:
      return 'foo';
  }
}

render() {
  return (
    <div>
      <div>
          // removed for brevity
      </div>
      {this.renderSwitch(param)}
      <div>
          // removed for brevity
      </div>
    </div>
  );
}

In contrast to other answers, I would prefer to inline the "switch" in the render function. It makes it more clear what components can be rendered at that position. You can implement a switch-like expression by using a plain old javascript object:

render () {
  return (
    <div>
      <div>
        {/* removed for brevity */}
      </div>
      {
        {
          'foo': <Foo />,
          'bar': <Bar />
        }[param]
      }
      <div>
        {/* removed for brevity */}
      </div>
    </div>
  )
}

That's happening, because switch statement is a statement, but here javascript expects an expression.

Although, it's not recommended to use switch statement in a render method, you can use self-invoking function to achieve this:

render() {
    // Don't forget to return a value in a switch statement
    return (
        <div>
            {(() => {
                switch(...) {}
            })()}
        </div>
    );
}

I did this inside the render() method:

  render() {
    const project = () => {
      switch(this.projectName) {

        case "one":   return <ComponentA />;
        case "two":   return <ComponentB />;
        case "three": return <ComponentC />;
        case "four":  return <ComponentD />;

        default:      return <h1>No project match</h1>
      }
    }

    return (
      <div>{ project() }</div>
    )
  }

I tried to keep the render() return clean, so I put my logic in a 'const' function right above. This way I can also indent my switch cases neatly.


I'm not a big fan of any of the current answers, because they are either too verbose, or require you to jump around the code to understand what is going on.

I prefer doing this in a more react component centred way, by creating a <Switch/>. The job of this component is to take a prop, and only render children whose child prop matches this one. So in the example below I have created a test prop on the switch, and compared it to a value prop on the children, only rendering the ones that match.

Example:

const Switch = props => {
  const { test, children } = props
  // filter out only children with a matching prop
  return children.find(child => {
    return child.props.value === test
  })      
}

const Sample = props => {
  const someTest = true
  return (
    <Switch test={someTest}>
      <div value={false}>Will display if someTest is false</div>
      <div value={true}>Will display if someTest is true</div>
    </Switch>
  )
}

ReactDOM.render(
  <Sample/>,
  document.getElementById("react")
);
<script src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/react/16.6.3/umd/react.production.min.js"></script>
<script src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/react-dom/16.6.3/umd/react-dom.production.min.js"></script>
<div id="react"></div>

You can make the switch as simple or as complex as you want. Don't forget to perform more robust checking of the children and their value props.