SQL Functions Cheat Sheet

String Functions

Function Purpose Example

UPPER() Convert text to uppercase UPPER('hello') → 'HELLO'

LOWER() Convert text to lowercase LOWER('HELLO') → 'hello'

TRIM() Remove spaces from TRIM(' hello ') → 'hello'

start/end
LENGTH() Find length of string LENGTH('SQL') → 3

SUBSTRING() / SUBSTR() Extract part of string SUBSTRING('SQLWorld', 1, 3) → 'SQL'

LEFT() Get leftmost characters LEFT('SQLWorld', 3) → 'SQL'

RIGHT() Get rightmost characters RIGHT('SQLWorld', 5) → 'World'

INSTR() Find position of substring INSTR('SQLWorld', 'World') → 4

POSITION() Find position of substring POSITION('World' IN 'SQLWorld') → 4

CONCAT() Join two strings CONCAT('SQL', 'World') → 'SQLWorld'

REPLACE() Replace part of string REPLACE('SQLWorld', 'SQL', 'Data') →

'DataWorld'

FIND_IN_SET() Find the position of a value FIND_IN_SET('b', 'a,b,c') → 2

inside a comma-separated
string
LPAD() Pad string from the left side LPAD('SQL', 5, '*') → '**SQL'
to a certain length

RPAD() Pad string from the right RPAD('SQL', 5, '*') → 'SQL**'

side to a certain length

FORMAT() Format a number with FORMAT(1234567.89, 2) → '1,234,567.89'

commas and decimal places
(MySQL)
 Aggregate & Statistical Functions

Function Purpose Example

COUNT() Number of rows COUNT(*)

SUM() Total sum SUM(salary)

AVG() Average value AVG(salary)

MIN() Minimum value MIN(age)

MAX() Maximum value MAX(age)

VAR_POP() or Population variance VAR_POP(salary) or

VARIANCE() (measure of spread) VARIANCE(salary)

STDDEV_POP() or Population standard STDDEV_POP(salary) or

STDDEV() deviation STDDEV(salary)

CORR() Correlation coefficient CORR(salary, age)

between two columns

COVAR_POP() Population covariance COVAR_POP(salary, age)

between two columns

PERCENTILE_CONT() Continuous percentile PERCENTILE_CONT(0.5)

calculation (for medians, WITHIN GROUP (ORDER BY
etc.) salary)
 Date and Time Functions

Function Purpose Example

CURRENT_DATE Today's date CURRENT_DATE

CURRENT_TIMESTAMP Current date + time CURRENT_TIMESTAMP

DATE_PART() Extract part of date DATE_PART('year', CURRENT_DATE)

EXTRACT() Extract year, month, etc. EXTRACT(MONTH FROM CURRENT_DATE)

AGE() Difference between dates AGE('2025-04-01', '2024-04-01') → 1 year

NOW() Current date-time NOW()

TO_CHAR() Format date/time TO_CHAR(NOW(), 'YYYY-MM-DD')

DATE() Extract date part only (no DATE(NOW()) → '2025-04-28'

time)

DATEDIFF() Difference between two DATEDIFF('2025-05-01', '2025-04-28') →

dates (in days)
3

DATE_ADD() Add interval to date DATE_ADD('2025-04-28', INTERVAL 5

DAY) → '2025-05-03'

Mathematical Functions

Function Purpose Example

ROUND() Round number ROUND(3.1415, 2) → 3.14

CEIL() / CEILING() Round up CEIL(3.2) → 4

FLOOR() Round down FLOOR(3.8) → 3

ABS() Absolute value ABS(-5) → 5

POWER() Exponentiation POWER(2,3) → 8

MOD() Remainder MOD(10,3) → 1

SQRT() Square root SQRT(25) → 5

 Conditional Functions

Function Purpose Example

CASE WHEN THEN ELSE END If-else logic CASE WHEN salary > 5000
THEN 'High' ELSE 'Low' END

COALESCE() Return first non-null value COALESCE(NULL, NULL,

'default') → 'default'

NULLIF() Returns NULL if values match NULLIF(5,5) → NULL

IFNULL() replaces a NULL with a value IFNULL(NULL, 'default') →

'default'

ISNULL() checks if something is NULL ISNULL(NULL) → 1 and

ISNULL('text') → 0

Conversion and Other Useful Functions

Function Purpose Example

CAST() Change data type CAST('123' AS INT)

CONVERT() Similar to CAST CONVERT(INT, '123')

DISTINCT Remove duplicates SELECT DISTINCT department

FROM employees

GROUP_CONCAT() / Merge values STRING_AGG(name, ',')

STRING_AGG()

JSON_VALUE() Extract value from JSON JSON_VALUE('{"a":1}', '$.a') → 1

 Window Functions

Function Purpose Example

Unique row number per ROW_NUMBER() OVER

partition (PARTITION BY dept ORDER
ROW_NUMBER() BY salary DESC)

Ranking (gaps allowed) RANK() OVER (ORDER BY

marks DESC)
RANK()
Ranking (no gaps) DENSE_RANK() OVER (ORDER
BY marks DESC)
DENSE_RANK()
Value from next row LEAD(salary) OVER (ORDER
BY emp_id)
LEAD()
Value from previous row LAG(salary) OVER (ORDER BY
emp_id)
LAG()
Distribute rows into n buckets NTILE(4) OVER (ORDER BY
salary)
NTILE(n)