Difference Between WHERE and HAVING Clause in SQL

In this post, we will understand the difference between WHERE clause and HAVING clause in SQL.

WHERE Clause

• It is used to filter the records from the table based on a specific condition.

• It can be used without the ‘GROUP BY’ clause.

• It can be used with row operations.

• It can’t contain the aggregate functions.

• It can be used with the ‘SELECT’, ‘UPDATE’, and ‘DELETE’ statements.

• It is used before the ‘GROUP BY’ clause if required.

• It is used with a single row function such as ‘UPPER’, ‘LOWER’.

HAVING Clause

• It is used to filter out records from the groups based on a specific condition.

• It can’t be used without the ‘GROUP BY’ clause.

• It works with the column operation.

• It can contain the aggregate functions.

• It can only be used with the ‘SELECT’ statement.

• It is used after the ‘GROUP BY’ clause.

• It can be used with multiple row functions such as ‘SUM’, ‘COUNT’.

Following is the syntax:

SELECT column1, column2
FROM table1, table2
WHERE [ conditions ]
GROUP BY column1, column2
HAVING [ conditions ]
ORDER BY column1, column2