coalesce.md

---

aliases:
- ../../configuration-language/standard-library/coalesce/
title: coalesce

---

coalesce

coalesce takes any number of arguments and returns the first one that isn't null, an empty string, empty list, or an empty object. It is useful for obtaining a default value, such as if an environment variable isn't defined. If no argument is non-empty or non-zero, the last argument is returned.

Examples

> coalesce("a", "b")
a
> coalesce("", "b")
b
> coalesce(env("DOES_NOT_EXIST"), "c")
c