Expressions



Expressions can be used in the field list of a Select, in Insert values, in Update assignments and in Where clauses.

  • Numbers: 10, -6, 3.14159
  • Strings: 'single quoted' or "double quoted". A doubled quote ('It''s') is not supported. A quote that follows a backslash does not end the string, but the backslash is kept: 'It's' returns It's.
  • Null: null


Operator Meaning
+ Adds numbers. When either side is a string, the values are concatenated: 'Id: ' + 5 returns 'Id: 5'.
- * / Subtraction, multiplication and division.
% Remainder (modulo).
Bitwise exclusive-or. Use Pow for exponentiation.
( ) Grouping, with standard order of operations.

A null on either side of + makes the result null (null propagation). Concat skips nulls instead.

These are used in Where clauses and join ON conditions:
Operator Meaning
= Equal (strings are compared without regard to case).
!= Not equal. The <> form is not supported.
> >= < <= Numeric comparisons.
LIKE, NOT LIKE Pattern matching, see Like.
BETWEEN, NOT BETWEEN Range matching, see Between.

Comparison operators can only be used in WHERE and ON clauses. Elsewhere, use the boolean functions such as IsEqual, IsGreater and IsLike, which return 1 or 0.

-- A line comment.
SELECT Id, Name FROM WordList:Language -- A trailing comment.
/* A block
   comment. */


Use Declare to define a variable for the rest of the script. Variables are referenced with an @ prefix. Applications using the client API pass parameters the same way, see Client.
DECLARE @Language = 2
SELECT Text FROM WordList:Word WHERE LanguageId = @Language


Every SELECT needs a FROM clause. To evaluate expressions that don't read any documents, select from the built-in Single schema, which contains exactly one document.
SELECT 10 + 10 as Twenty, 'Hello' + ' ' + 'World' as Greeting, Guid() as Id FROM Single




SQL :: Distinct
Removes duplicate rows from the results of a SELECT.
SQL :: DocumentID
Removed: The DocumentID() function is no longer available.
SQL :: DocumentUID
Removed: The DocumentUID() function is no longer available.
SQL :: Floor
Returns the largest whole number that is less than or equal to the given number.
SQL :: FormatDateTime
Parses a date/time value and returns it formatted with a .NET date/time format string. See DateTime for the format specifiers.
SQL :: FormatNumeric
Formats a number using a .NET numeric format string and returns the result as text.
SQL :: GeometricMean
Returns the geometric mean of the values in each group: the nth root of their product. Useful for growth rates and ratios.
SQL :: Group By
Group by collapses a result set into one row per distinct set of values.
SQL :: Guid
Returns a new random globally unique identifier.
SQL :: IfNull
Returns the given value, or the default value when the given value is null.