MySQL | SELECT
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MySQL's SELECT statement allows us to retrieve records from a database.
Syntax
SELECT column_name(s)FROM table_name;
Examples
Consider the following table about some students:
student_id | fname | lname | day_enrolled | age | username |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Sky | Towner | 2015-12-03 | 17 | stowner1 |
2 | Ben | Davis | 2016-04-20 | 19 | bdavis2 |
3 | Travis | Apple | 2018-08-14 | 18 | tapple3 |
4 | Arthur | David | 2016-04-01 | 16 | adavid4 |
5 | Benjamin | Town | 2014-01-01 | 17 | btown5 |
The above sample table can be created using the code here.
All columns
To return all columns from the table students:
SELECT * FROM students;
+------------+----------+--------+--------------+------+----------+| student_id | fname | lname | day_enrolled | age | username |+------------+----------+--------+--------------+------+----------+| 1 | Sky | Towner | 2015-12-03 | 17 | stowner1 || 2 | Ben | Davis | 2016-04-20 | 19 | bdavis2 || 3 | Travis | Apple | 2018-08-14 | 18 | tapple3 || 4 | Arthur | David | 2016-04-01 | 16 | adavid4 || 5 | Benjamin | Town | 2014-01-01 | 17 | btown5 |+------------+----------+--------+--------------+------+----------+
Selecting to retrieve all columns is essentially equivalent to fetching the entire table.
Specific columns
To only retrieve fname and lname columns (in that order) from the table students:
SELECT fname, lname FROM students;
+----------+--------+| fname | lname |+----------+--------+| Sky | Towner || Ben | Davis || Travis | Apple || Arthur | David || Benjamin | Town |+----------+--------+
WHERE clause
SELECT may be used with a WHERE clause to specify conditions a row must satisfy to be retrieved.
To only retrieve students who are older than 17:
SELECT * FROM studentsWHERE age > 17;
+------------+--------+-------+--------------+------+----------+| student_id | fname | lname | day_enrolled | age | username |+------------+--------+-------+--------------+------+----------+| 2 | Ben | Davis | 2016-04-20 | 19 | bdavis2 || 3 | Travis | Apple | 2018-08-14 | 18 | tapple3 |+------------+--------+-------+--------------+------+----------+
'Ben' and 'Travis' are the only students who are older than 17 in the table students.
