Basically, SOUNDEX() function is used to return the Soundex, a phonetic algorithm for indexing names after English pronunciation of sound, a string of a string. The proper structure for searching within MySQL using SOUNDEX() is as follows −
SOUNDEX(Str)
Here, Str is the string whose SOUNDEX string is to be retrieved.
Example
mysql> Select SOUNDEX('MySQL'); +------------------+ | SOUNDEX('MySQL') | +------------------+ | M240 | +------------------+ 1 row in set (0.00 sec) mysql> Select SOUNDEX('harshit'); +--------------------+ | SOUNDEX('harshit') | +--------------------+ | H623 | +--------------------+ 1 row in set (0.00 sec) mysql> Select SOUNDEX('hrst'); +-----------------+ | SOUNDEX('hrst') | +-----------------+ | H623 | +-----------------+ 1 row in set (0.00 sec)
The result of SOUNDEX(‘harshit’) and SOUNDEX(‘hrst’) is same because the sound of both the words is same.