SQL Server CHAR(N) Data Type

The SQL Server CHAR(N) data type is a data type used to store fixed-length strings. It can store any string with a length less than or equal to N, and all values stored in a CHAR column have the same length. In SQL Server, the CHAR data type is typically used to store fixed-length string data.

Syntax

The syntax for the CHAR(N) data type is as follows:

CHAR(N)

Here, N represents the length of the string to be stored.

Use Cases

The CHAR(N) data type is typically used to store fixed-length string data. For example, CHAR(50) data type can be used to store a string with a length of 50 characters. Since all values in the CHAR data type have the same length, they are more efficient for storing and retrieving data than variable-length strings.

Examples

Here are two examples of using the CHAR(N) data type:

Example 1

Suppose there is a table named Customers that contains a FirstName column and a LastName column. The CHAR data type can be used to store the first and last names of each customer. For example, the following statement can be used to create the Customers table:

CREATE TABLE Customers (
    CustomerID INT PRIMARY KEY,
    FirstName CHAR(50),
    LastName CHAR(50)
)

The following statement can be used to insert a new record into the Customers table:

INSERT INTO Customers (CustomerID, FirstName, LastName)
VALUES (1, 'John', 'Doe')

The following statement can be used to retrieve records from the Customers table:

SELECT * FROM Customers

It will return the following result:

CustomerID	FirstName	LastName
1	John	Doe

Example 2

Suppose there is a table named Employees that contains an EmployeeName column used to store the name of the employees. The CHAR data type can be used to store the employee names to ensure that each employee name has the same length. For example, the following statement can be used to create the Employees table:

CREATE TABLE Employees (
    EmployeeID INT PRIMARY KEY,
    EmployeeName CHAR(50)
)

The following statement can be used to insert a new record into the Employees table:

INSERT INTO Employees (EmployeeID, EmployeeName)
VALUES (1, 'Jane Smith')

The following statement can be used to retrieve records from the Employees table:

SELECT * FROM Employees