MySQL | MID method
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MySQL's MID(~) method returns a substring with length len characters from the input string str starting at position pos.
Parameters
1. str | string
The string to return the substring from.
2. pos | number
The start position for the returned substring. Note that MySQL begins counting position from 1 and not 0.
3. len | number
The number of characters to return starting from start position.
Return value
A substring with length len characters from the input string str starting at position pos.
Examples
Consider the following table about some students:
student_id | fname | lname | day_enrolled | age | username |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Sky | Towner | 2015-12-03 | 17 | stowner1 |
2 | Ben | Davis | 2016-04-20 | 19 | bdavis2 |
3 | Travis | Apple | 2018-08-14 | 18 | tapple3 |
4 | Arthur | David | 2016-04-01 | 16 | adavid4 |
5 | Benjamin | Town | 2014-01-01 | 17 | btown5 |
The above sample table can be created using the code here.
Basic usage
To return a 3 character substring starting from the second letter of student last names:
SELECT lname, MID(lname, 2, 3)FROM students;
+--------+----------------+| lname | MID(lname,2,3) |+--------+----------------+| Towner | own || Davis | avi || Apple | ppl || David | avi || Town | own |+--------+----------------+
To return a 2 character substring from 'Hello' starting from the third letter:
SELECT MID('Hello', 3, 2);
+--------------------+| MID('Hello', 3, 2) |+--------------------+| ll |+--------------------+
