{"id":15517,"date":"2024-03-15T11:19:44","date_gmt":"2024-03-15T11:19:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.silicloud.com\/blog\/what-is-the-purpose-of-using-rownum-in-sql\/"},"modified":"2025-08-06T19:17:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-06T19:17:08","slug":"what-is-the-purpose-of-using-rownum-in-sql","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.silicloud.com\/blog\/what-is-the-purpose-of-using-rownum-in-sql\/","title":{"rendered":"What is the purpose of using ROWNUM in SQL?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In SQL, ROWNUM is a pseudo column used to limit the number of rows returned in the result set. Its usage is as follows:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Choose<\/li>\n<li>The sequence number of a row in a database table<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<pre class=\"post-pre\"><code><span class=\"hljs-keyword\">SELECT<\/span> <span class=\"hljs-operator\">*<\/span> <span class=\"hljs-keyword\">FROM<\/span> table_name <span class=\"hljs-keyword\">WHERE<\/span> ROWNUM <span class=\"hljs-operator\">&lt;=<\/span> <span class=\"hljs-number\">10<\/span>;\r\n<\/code><\/pre>\n<p>The above query will retrieve the first 10 rows from the table called table_name.<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Sort by<\/li>\n<li>ROWNUM refers to a pseudocolumn in Oracle that numbers each row in the result set of a query.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<pre class=\"post-pre\"><code><span class=\"hljs-keyword\">SELECT<\/span> <span class=\"hljs-operator\">*<\/span> <span class=\"hljs-keyword\">FROM<\/span> (\r\n  <span class=\"hljs-keyword\">SELECT<\/span> t.<span class=\"hljs-operator\">*<\/span>, ROWNUM <span class=\"hljs-keyword\">AS<\/span> rnum <span class=\"hljs-keyword\">FROM<\/span> (\r\n    <span class=\"hljs-keyword\">SELECT<\/span> <span class=\"hljs-operator\">*<\/span> <span class=\"hljs-keyword\">FROM<\/span> table_name <span class=\"hljs-keyword\">ORDER<\/span> <span class=\"hljs-keyword\">BY<\/span> column_name\r\n  ) t\r\n) <span class=\"hljs-keyword\">WHERE<\/span> rnum <span class=\"hljs-operator\">&gt;=<\/span> <span class=\"hljs-number\">11<\/span> <span class=\"hljs-keyword\">AND<\/span> rnum <span class=\"hljs-operator\">&lt;=<\/span> <span class=\"hljs-number\">20<\/span>;\r\n<\/code><\/pre>\n<p>The above query will return rows 11 to 20 in the table_name table sorted by column_name.<\/p>\n<p>It is important to note that ROWNUM is calculated after the query results are returned. Therefore, when using ROWNUM for pagination, the query results need to be processed as a subquery in order to correctly obtain pagination results.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In SQL, ROWNUM is a pseudo column used to limit the number of rows returned in the result set. Its usage is as follows: Choose The sequence number of a row in a database table SELECT * FROM table_name WHERE ROWNUM &lt;= 10; The above query will retrieve the first 10 rows from the table [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_import_markdown_pro_load_document_selector":0,"_import_markdown_pro_submit_text_textarea":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[453,1402,299,1404,1403],"class_list":["post-15517","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-development","tag-guide","tag-programming","tag-technology","tag-tutorial"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v21.5 (Yoast SEO v21.5) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>What is the purpose of using ROWNUM in SQL? - Blog - Silicon Cloud<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Learn about what is the purpose of using rownum in sql?. Comprehensive guide with examples and best practices.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.silicloud.com\/blog\/what-is-the-purpose-of-using-rownum-in-sql\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"What is the purpose of using ROWNUM in SQL?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Learn about what is the purpose of using rownum in sql?. 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