SQL SELECT TOP, LIMIT and ROWNUM Keywords

SELECT TOP, LIMIT and ROWNUM

The LIMIT, SELECT TOP or ROWNUM command is used to specify the number of records to return.

Note: SQL Server uses SELECT TOP. MySQL uses LIMIT, and Oracle uses ROWNUM.

The following SQL statement selects the first three records from the "Customers" table (SQL SERVER):

Example

 SELECT TOP 3 * FROM Customers;

The following SQL statement shows the equivalent example using the LIMIT clause (MySQL):

Example

 SELECT * FROM Customers
LIMIT 3;

The following SQL statement shows the equivalent example using ROWNUM (Oracle):

Example

SELECT * FROM Customers
WHERE ROWNUM  <= 3;