Difference between char,varchar,nvarchar, nchar,varchar2

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Difference between char,varchar,nvarchar, nchar,varchar2

Nisha N.Kumar

Ten Centuries

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September 19, 2007 at 3:49 am

#177179

Hi,
Can anyone please give me the exact difference between char,varchar,nchar nvarchar,varchar2 datatypes used in sql
Thanks in advance
Nisha

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Kishore.P SSCrazy Eights Points: 8147 More actions · Answer 1

Kishore.P

SSCrazy Eights

Points: 8147

September 19, 2007 at 3:53 am

#734504

see SQL BOL.

Kishore.P

Christopher Stobbs SSC-Insane Points: 21098 More actions · Answer 2

ms-help://MS.SQLCC.v9/MS.SQLSVR.v9.en/tsqlref9/html/a54f7373-b247-4d61-8fb8-7f2ec7a8d0a4.htm

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Nisha N.Kumar Ten Centuries Points: 1100 More actions · Answer 3

Hi,

I have seen it in BOL.

The size for char and varchar is given as 1 through 8000 bytes.

But in google when i searched it says that varchar stores upto 2000 and varchar2 stores upto 4000 bytes.Char stores upto 2000 bytes.

Can you please make it clear.

Thanks,

Nisha.

Fracn Old Hand Points: 389 More actions · Answer 4

The char data type is a fixed-length ANSI character data type when the NOT NULL clause is specified. If a value shorter than the length of the column is inserted into a char NOT NULL column, the value is right-padded with blanks to the size of the column. For example, if a column is defined as char(10) and the data to be stored is "music", SQL Server stores this data as "music_____", where "_" indicates a blank.

The varchar data type is a variable-length ANSI character data type. Values shorter than the size of the column are not right-padded to the size of the column.

The nchar/nvarchar (national char, varchar) data type is a fixed-length/variable-lenght Unicode character data of n characters (n must be a value from 1 through 4,000).

You can use char/nchar when the data values in a column are expected to be consistently close to the same size or varchar/nvarchar when the data values in a column are expected to vary considerably in size.

Nisha N.Kumar Ten Centuries Points: 1100 More actions · Answer 5

Thanks Fracn

Could you please tell the size for each datatype

char,varchar and varchar2

Fracn Old Hand Points: 389 More actions · Answer 6

Sorry, I posted before ending...

For char and varchar, n must be a value from 1 through 8000.

Does the Varchar2 exist for SQL? I know it's used by Oracle...

Nisha N.Kumar Ten Centuries Points: 1100 More actions · Answer 7

Yes Fracn

varchar2 is used by Oracle only

Thanks for your reply

Nisha