For some use cases, when matching enums, match is awkward. For example:

#![allow(unused_variables)]
fn main() {
// Make `optional` of type `Option<i32>`
let optional = Some(7);

match optional {
    Some(i) => {
        println!("This is a really long string and `{:?}`", i);
        // ^ Needed 2 indentations just so we could destructure
        // `i` from the option.
    },
    _ => {},
    // ^ Required because `match` is exhaustive. Doesn't it seem
    // like wasted space?
};

}

if let is cleaner for this use case and in addition allows various failure options to be specified:

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In the same way, if let can be used to match any enum value:

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enum, Option, and the RFC