SQL CREATE TABLE Statement

The CREATE TABLE Statement

The CREATE TABLE statement is used to create a table in a database.

SQL CREATE TABLE Syntax

CREATE TABLE table_name
(
column_name1 data_type,
column_name2 data_type,
column_name3 data_type,
....
)

The data type specifies what type of data the column can hold. For a complete reference of all the data types available in MS Access, MySQL, and SQL Server, go to our complete Data Types reference.

---

CREATE TABLE Example

Now we want to create a table called "Persons" that contains five columns: P_Id, LastName, FirstName, Address, and City.

We use the following CREATE TABLE statement:

CREATE TABLE Persons
(
P_Id int,
LastName varchar(255),
FirstName varchar(255),
Address varchar(255),
City varchar(255)
)

The P_Id column is of type int and will hold a number. The LastName, FirstName, Address, and City columns are of type varchar with a maximum length of 255 characters.

The empty "Persons" table will now look like this:

P_Id	LastName	FirstName	Address	City

The empty table can be filled with data with the INSERT INTO statement.