What is the usage of the FIELD function in MySQL?

In MySQL, the FIELD function is used to return the index position of a specified value in a given list. Its syntax is as follows:

Choose a value from a list of options consisting of value, value1, value2, and so on.

In this, the value is the value to be looked for, value1, value2, and so on are the values in the given list. The FIELD function will return the index position of value in the list, and if value is not in the list, it will return 0.

Here is an example:

The result returned is 3 because ‘orange’ is located at the 3rd index position in the list.

The result returned is 0 because ‘peach’ is not in the list.

The FIELD function is commonly used in sorting and querying to specify the priority of fields or a specific sorting order.