What is the typical use of the 'break' statement in loop structures?

The 'break' statement is typically used within loop structures to exit the loop prematurely. When 'break' is encountered, the control flow immediately transfers to the statement following the loop, thereby terminating any further iterations of that loop. This can be particularly useful when a certain condition is met inside the loop, and you want to stop executing it without running through all the iterations.

For instance, in searching algorithms, if a specific item is found before reaching the end of a collection, using 'break' allows the program to stop searching right away, enhancing efficiency. This behavior distinguishes 'break' from other statements like 'continue', which would skip to the next iteration, or initializing/resetting a counter, which doesn't relate to terminating a loop. Thus, the proper understanding of 'break' is crucial for effective control flow in programming.