SQL CASE Statement

The SQL CASE Statement

The CASE statement goes through conditions and return a value when the first condition is met (like an IF-THEN-ELSE statement). So, once a condition is true, it will stop reading and return the result. If no conditions are true, it returns the value in the ELSE clause.

If there is no ELSE part and no conditions are true, it returns NULL.

CASE Syntax

CASE
    WHEN condition1 THEN result1
    WHEN condition2 THEN result2
    WHEN conditionN THEN resultN
    ELSE result
END;

Demo Database

Below is a selection from the "OrderDetails" table in the Northwind sample database:

SQL CASE Examples

The following SQL goes through conditions and returns a value when the first condition is met:

SELECT OrderID, Quantity,
CASE
    WHEN Quantity > 30 THEN "The quantity is greater than 30"
    WHEN Quantity = 30 THEN "The quantity is 30"
    ELSE "The quantity is under 30"
END
FROM OrderDetails

The following SQL will order the customers by City. However, if City is NULL, then order by Country:

SELECT CustomerName, City, Country
FROM Customers
ORDER BY
(CASE
    WHEN City IS NULL THEN Country
    ELSE City
END);