SQL LIKE, IN and BETWEEN

LIKE, IN and BETWEEN are short ways to write common WHERE conditions.

LIKE: Search for a Pattern

LIKE compares text with a pattern. Two wildcards stand for unknown characters:

Names that start with "A":

SELECT name
FROM students
WHERE name LIKE 'A%';

Names that contain "Iq" anywhere:

SELECT name
FROM students
WHERE name LIKE '%Iq%';

"Siddiqui" also matches, because it contains the letters "iq". In MySQL and SQL Server LIKE usually ignores upper and lower case. In PostgreSQL it does not, and you would use ILIKE to ignore case.

Names whose second letter is "a":

SELECT name
FROM students
WHERE name LIKE '_a%';

More LIKE Patterns

Use NOT LIKE to find values that do not match.

IN: Match Any Value in a List

IN is a short way to write several OR conditions on the same column:

SELECT name, city
FROM students
WHERE city IN ('Lahore', 'Islamabad');

This is the same as WHERE city = 'Lahore' OR city = 'Islamabad', but shorter. NOT IN gives the opposite.

IN with a Subquery

The list can come from another query. These are the courses that have at least one student:

SELECT title
FROM courses
WHERE id IN (SELECT course_id FROM students);

Digital Marketing is missing because no student has course_id 4.

BETWEEN: Pick a Range

BETWEEN selects values inside a range. Both ends are included.

SELECT name, age
FROM students
WHERE age BETWEEN 19 AND 21;

NOT BETWEEN returns the values outside the range:

SELECT name, marks
FROM students
WHERE marks NOT BETWEEN 70 AND 90;

BETWEEN also works with text and dates, for example WHERE join_date BETWEEN '2026-01-01' AND '2026-06-30'.

Exercise