Named Return Values

Return values may be given names, and if they are, then they are treated the same as if they were new variables defined at the top of the function.

Named return values are best thought of as a way to document the purpose of the returned values.

According to the tour of go:

A return statement without arguments returns the named return values. This is known as a "naked" return. Naked return statements should be used only in short functions. They can harm readability in longer functions.

Named return values are what enable naked returns. Use naked returns only in short functions where the purpose of the returned values is obvious.

func getCoords() (x, y int) {
	// x and y are initialized with zero values

	return // automatically returns x and y
}

Is the same as:

func getCoords() (int, int) {
	var x int
	var y int
	return x, y
}

In the first example, x and y are the return values. At the end of the function, we could simply write return to return the values of those two variables, rather than writing return x,y.