Limit Data Selections in PHP and MySQL

Limit the number of data choices from a MySQL database

There is a LIMIT clause in MySQL that lets you tell it how many records to return.

The LIMIT clause makes it easy to code multi-page results or pagination in SQL, which is very useful for large tables. When a lot of records are returned, it can slow things down.

Let’s say we want to get all of the records from 1 to 50 from a table called “result.” This is how the SQL query would then look:

$sql = “SELECT * FROM results LIMIT 50”;

When the above SQL query is run, the first 50 records will be returned.

What if we want to pick records between 26 and 35?

Mysql also has a way to handle this, which is to use the OFFSET command.

In the SQL query below, it says “return only 10 records, start on record 26 (OFFSET 25)”:

$sql = “SELECT * FROM results LIMIT 20 OFFSET 25”;

You could also get the same result with a shorter sentence:

$sql = “SELECT * FROM results LIMIT 25, 20”;

When you use a comma, the numbers are written in the wrong order.