When is never? (Waffle at RustWeek)

Waffle explains the history, challenges, and current progress of stabilizing the never type in the Rust compiler.

When is never? by waffle. The never type has been unstable for 10 years... but *why*? I want to explain what the never type is, show parallels with types in other programming languages, explain what are the challenges in bringing the never type to stable and what is the current progress on that. You can find the slides to this talk here: rustweek26slides.waffle.pet/ About waffle (it/its): A non-binary compiler witch working on the rust compiler as a member of the compiler team. Co-creator of the unfair rust quiz. I've worked on Rust features like ""explicit tail calls"" and ""the never type"", among many other things. The description for this field seems to imply that I should put something silly here too, not just the dry boring facts... I love hiking on mountains, both in Celeste (the critically acclaimed 2018 platformer) and in real life. meow :3 - git: github.com/WaffleLapkin - bluesky: bsky.app/profile/wffl.ihatereality.space - mastodon/fedi: im-in.space/@wffl - website: blog.ihatereality.space This talk was given at RustWeek 2026 as part of the Main track on Tuesday 19 May. You can find a playlist of all talks in this track at youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8Q1w7Ff68DCvQXADosMcF0aMvLhGXU4S, and a playlist of all RustWeek 2026 talks at youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8Q1w7Ff68DBpmF38rcIAf8Z9Gj2TnlgM For information about RustWeek 2027, go to 2027.rustweek.org. We hope to see you there!