PostgreSQL - select last N rows

In this article, we would like to show you how to select last N rows from a table in PostgreSQL.

Quick solution

Ascending order:

SELECT * FROM (
    SELECT * FROM "table_name" 
	 ORDER BY "column_name" DESC
	 LIMIT N
) subquery
ORDER BY "column_name" ASC;

Descending order:

SELECT * FROM "table_name" 
ORDER BY "column_name" DESC 
LIMIT N;

Practical example

To show how to select last N rows from a table, we will use the following table:

Note:

At the end of this article you can find database preparation SQL queries.

Example - ascending order

In this example, we will select last three users from the users table in ascending order.

Query:

SELECT * FROM (
    SELECT * FROM "users" 
	 ORDER BY "id" DESC
	 LIMIT 3
) subquery
ORDER BY "id" ASC;

Output:

Example - descending order

In this example, we will select last three users from the users table in descending order.

Query:

SELECT * FROM "users" ORDER BY "id" DESC LIMIT 3;

Output:

Database preparation

create_tables.sql file:

CREATE TABLE "users" (
	"id" SERIAL PRIMARY KEY,
	"name" VARCHAR(100) NOT NULL,
	"country" VARCHAR(15) NOT NULL
);

insert_data.sql file:

INSERT INTO "users"
	("name", "country")
VALUES
	('Tom', 'Poland'),
	('Chris', 'Spain'),
	('Jack', 'Spain'),
    ('Kim', 'Vietnam'),
    ('Marco', 'Italy'),
	('Kate', 'Spain'),
	('Nam', 'Vietnam');