Varchar

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A VARCHAR or variable character field is a set of character data of indeterminate length. The term varchar refers to a data type of a field (or column) in a database which can hold letters and numbers. [1] Varchar fields can be of any size up to a limit, which varies by databases: an Oracle 11g database has a limit of 4000 bytes, [2] a MySQL 5.7 database has a limit of 65,535 bytes (for the entire row) [3] and Microsoft SQL Server 2008 has a limit of 8000 bytes (unless varchar(max) is used, which has a maximum storage capacity of 2 gigabytes). [4]

nvarchar is a variation of varchar, [5] and which is more suitable depends on the use case.[ clarification needed ]

See also

References

  1. ↑ "The VARCHAR data type". www.ibm.com. 2018-10-25. Retrieved 2025-11-25.
  2. ↑ "Database Concepts". docs.oracle.com.
  3. ↑ "MySQL :: MySQL 5.7 Reference Manual :: 11.4.1 The CHAR and VARCHAR Types". dev.mysql.com.
  4. ↑ edmacauley (6 June 2024). "char and varchar (Transact-SQL)". msdn.microsoft.com.
  5. ↑ SQL Server differences of char, nchar, varchar and nvarchar data types
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