CHAR ​

The CHAR data type is conceptually a fixed-length character string that is padded with trailing blanks.

Trailing blanks are removed from strings in CHAR columns when the data is stored. Blanks are restored on output to the client. A CHAR(5) column, for example, returns 5 bytes to the client but may store fewer than 5 bytes in the database.

All CHAR-related functions and operators work on a compact (trimmed) representation of the input data. A CHAR string behaves exactly like a VARCHAR string without the trailing spaces. For example, 'abc '::char(10) is exactly equivalent to 'abc'::varchar(10).

For more details and examples, see Trailing Blanks in Character Data.

An attempt to load a string that is longer than the specified length of a CHAR column results in a value too long error.

In terms of the data type hierarchy for character strings, VARCHAR has precedence over CHAR, and CHAR has precedence over UNKNOWN.

A CHAR column without a length specification defaults to a 1-byte column.

The maximum length of a CHAR column is 64000 bytes. The maximum length of a row in a table is 64231 bytes. See Maximum Row Size.

Parent topic:SQL Data Types