How to Use the RIGHT() Function in MySQL

08/05/2021

Contents

In this article, you will learn how to use the RIGHT() function in MySQL.

Using the RIGHT() function in MySQL

In MySQL, the RIGHT() function is used to extract a specified number of characters from the end of a string.

Syntax

RIGHT(str, length);

Examples

Here are some examples of using the RIGHT() function in MySQL:

Extracting the last N characters of a string

To extract the last N characters of a string, you can use the RIGHT() function.

Syntax
SELECT RIGHT(str, length);
Example
SELECT RIGHT('Hello World', 5);

Output:

+------------------------+
| RIGHT('Hello World', 5)|
+------------------------+
| World                  |
+------------------------+

In this example, the RIGHT() function returns the last 5 characters of the string ‘Hello World’, which are ‘World’.

Extracting the last N characters of a column value

You can also use the RIGHT() function to extract the last N characters of a column value.

Syntax
SELECT RIGHT(column_name, length) FROM table_name;
Example
SELECT RIGHT(name, 3) FROM employees;

Output:

+--------------+
| RIGHT(name, 3)|
+--------------+
| ohn           |
| nn            |
| ich           |
| ara           |
+--------------+

In this example, the RIGHT() function returns the last 3 characters of the name column in the employees table.

Using the last N characters of a string in a WHERE clause

You can use the RIGHT() function in a WHERE clause to filter records based on the last N characters of a string.

Syntax
SELECT * FROM table_name WHERE RIGHT(column_name, length) = string_value;
Example
SELECT * FROM employees WHERE RIGHT(name, 3) = 'ohn';

Output:

+----+------+--------+------------+
| id | name | salary | hire_date  |
+----+------+--------+------------+
| 1  | John | 50000  | 2020-01-01 |
+----+------+--------+------------+

In this example, the SELECT statement returns all the records from the employees table where the last 3 characters of the name column are equal to ‘ohn’.