MySQL - IF() function example

In this article, we would like to show you IF() function example in MySQL.

Quick solution:

SELECT IF(condition, if_true, if_false);

Practical examples

Example 1

In this example, we will check two conditions, the first one will return true, and the second one will return false.

Query:

SELECT IF(1000 > 1, 'condition1_true', 'condition1_false') AS 'condition1_check';

SELECT IF(1000 < 1, 'condition2_true', 'condition2_false') AS 'condition2_check';

Result:

Example 2

To show you how IF() function works, we will use the following table:

Note:

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

In this example, we will display salary column from users table and salary_information which is created with IF() function.

Query:

SELECT
    `salary`,
    IF(`salary` > 6000, 'high_salary', 'average_salary') AS 'salary_information'
FROM `users`;

Result:

Database preparation

create_tables.sql file:

CREATE TABLE `users` (
	`id` INT(10) UNSIGNED NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT,
	`name` VARCHAR(50) NOT NULL,
	`surname` VARCHAR(50) NOT NULL,
	`department_id` INT(10) UNSIGNED,
    `salary` DECIMAL(15,2) NOT NULL,
	PRIMARY KEY (`id`)
);

insert_data.sql file:

INSERT INTO `users`
	( `name`, `surname`, `department_id`, `salary`)
VALUES
	('John', 'Stewart', 1, '3512.00'),
	('Chris', 'Brown', 2, '1344.00'),
	('Kate', 'Lewis', 3, '6574.00'),
	('Ailisa', 'Gomez', NULL, '6500.00'),
	('Gwendolyn', 'James', 2, '4200.00'),
	('Simon', 'Collins', 4, '3320.00'),
	('Taylor', 'Martin', 2, '1500.00'),
	('Andrew', 'Thompson', NULL, '2100.00');