Return or assignment can be lifted out

Reports if, when, and try statements that can be converted to expressions by lifting the return statement or an assignment out.

Example:

  fun foo(arg: Int): String {
      when (arg) {
          0 -> return "Zero"
          1 -> return "One"
          else -> return "Multiple"
      }
  }

After the quick-fix is applied:

  fun foo(arg: Int): String {
      return when (arg) {
          0 -> "Zero"
          1 -> "One"
          else -> "Multiple"
      }
  }

If you would like this inspection to highlight more complex code with multi-statement branches, uncheck the option "Report only if each branch is a single statement".

Locating this inspection

By ID

Can be used to locate inspection in e.g. Qodana configuration files, where you can quickly enable or disable it, or adjust its settings.

LiftReturnOrAssignment

Via Settings dialog

Path to the inspection settings via IntelliJ Platform IDE Settings dialog, when you need to adjust inspection settings directly from your IDE.

Settings or Preferences | Editor | Inspections | Kotlin | Style issues

Inspection options

Here you can find the description of settings available for the Return or assignment can be lifted out inspection, and the reference of their default values.

Report only if each branch is a single statement: Default value:
Selected

Suppressing Inspection

You can suppress this inspection by placing the following comment marker before the code fragment where you no longer want messages from this inspection to appear:

//noinspection LiftReturnOrAssignment

More detailed instructions as well as other ways and options that you have can be found in the product documentation:

IntelliJ IDEA 2025.2

Inspection Details
By default bundled with:	IntelliJ IDEA 2025.2, Qodana for JVM 2025.2,

Last modified: 18 September 2025