Error Handling (try-catch)

In this lesson you will learn error handling in Kotlin with try-catch, so an unexpected failure does not bring your whole program down. This is for anyone searching for "Kotlin try catch how to use".

try / catch catches errors (exceptions) so the program keeps running. It works like insurance: you decide in advance what to do if something goes wrong.

The sample code tries to divide by zero inside the try block and catches only that specific kind of failure with catch (e: ArithmeticException). Naming the exception type keeps you from accidentally swallowing errors you did not anticipate.

A common stumbling block for beginners is that Kotlin has no "checked exceptions" and does not force a try-catch as Java does. It never checks at compile time whether you handled an error, leaving the judgement to you.

In real-world development, splitting your catch blocks by exception type lets you write a response tailored to each cause.

📖 Reference code

fun divide(a: Int, b: Int): Int {
    if (b == 0) throw ArithmeticException("cannot divide by zero")
    return a / b
}

fun main() {
    try {
        println(divide(10, 2))
        println(divide(10, 0))
    } catch (e: ArithmeticException) {
        println("Error: ${e.message}")
    }
}

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