Syntax

ENUM(value1, value2, ...)

Storage

Description

Stores one value of a predefined list of possible strings. When you create an ENUM column, you provide a list of all possible values. Inserts and updates are allowed to set the column to values only from that list. Any attempt to insert a value that is not part of the enumeration will cause an empty string to be stored instead.

You may reference the list of possible values by index where the index of the first possible value is 0. For example:

SELECT COLID FROM TBL WHERE COLENUM = 0;

Assuming COLID is a primary key column and COLENUM is the column of type ENUM, this SQL will retrieve the primary keys of all rows in which the COLENUM value equals the first value of that list. Similarly, sorting on ENUM columns happens according to index, not string value.

The maximum number of elements allowed for an ENUM column is 65,535.