Seems like you are referring to use Switch which is a source filter and strongly discouraged.

> but saw some comments on using when instead.

This is most likely referring to given/when activated with use feature "switch" or use 5.10

see https://perldoc.perl.org/perlsyn#Switch-Statements

but also the limitations listed in

https://perldoc.perl.org/perlsyn#Experimental-Details-on-given-and-when

Short version

You can use given/when as long as you stick to the simple to predict patterns. Because when is based on ~~ Smartmatch-Operator (which is already too smart) unless it is not (sigh)

workarounds

Most ppl I know - me included - prefer simpler workarounds depending on the use case like:

a) For multiple tests till it fits

• chained boolean tests
  • if/elsif/else
  • && do {} patterns with explicit last or next to break out °

b) For faster direct lookup of the case (i.e. the comparison operation is always equality eq or == )

• hashes for values
• hash-dispatch tables for code
• goto CASE_LABEL (plus explicit last or next to break out °)

As you can see is switch trying to be overly clever and to cover a multitude of cases and optimizations.

It would really help to know your explicit use case.

°) I originally wrote "explicit break", but as Athanasius msged me are "break statement only for given/when constructs". Thanks Athanasius++ :)