How to remove double or more spaces from a string in MySQL?

You can create a function to remove double or more spaces from a string. The syntax is as follows:

DELIMITER //
create function yourFunctionName(paramter1,...N) returns datatype;
begin
//your statement.
end;
//
DELIMITER ;

Here’s how to create a function:

mysql> delimiter //
mysql> create function function_DeleteSpaces(value varchar(200)) returns varchar(200)
   -> begin
   -> set value = trim(value);
   -> while instr(value, ' ') > 0 do
   -> set value = replace(value, ' ', ' ');
   -> end while;
   -> return value;
   -> END;
   -> //
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.20 sec)
mysql> delimiter ;

Now you can call the function using a select statement. The syntax is as follows:

SELECT yourFunctionName();

Call the above function using a select statement. The above function removes the spaces from the string:

mysql> select function_DeleteSpaces(' John Smith ');

The following is the output:

+--------------------------------------------------+
| function_DeleteSpaces(' John Smith ')            |
+--------------------------------------------------+
| John Smith                                       |
+--------------------------------------------------+
1 row in set (0.02 sec)

The above function removes more than one spaces. Let us see another example with a new value in the function’s parameter:

mysql> select function_DeleteSpaces(' John Smith 123 ');

The following is the output:

+---------------------------------------------------------+
| function_DeleteSpaces(' John Smith 123 ')               |
+---------------------------------------------------------+
| John Smith 123                                          |
+---------------------------------------------------------+
1 row in set (0.00 sec)