PostgreSQL - select first N rows

In this article, we would like to show you how to find and select the first row from a table in PostgreSQL.

Quick solution:

SELECT "column1", "column2", "columnN"
FROM "table_name"
LIMIT N;

Practical example

To show how to select the first 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 1 - select all columns

In this example, we will select all the information (columns) about the first 3 users from the users table.

Query:

SELECT *
FROM "users"
LIMIT 3;

Output:

Example 2 - select specified columns

In this example, we will find the first 3 users id,  name and email column information.

Query:

SELECT "id", "name", "email"
FROM "users"
LIMIT 3;

Output:

Example 3 - first row in some order

In this example, we will select the first row in some order.

SELECT *
FROM "users"
ORDER BY "name"
LIMIT 3;

Output:

Database preparation

create_tables.sql file:

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

insert_data.sql file:

INSERT INTO "users"
	("name", "email", "country")
VALUES
	('Tom', 'tom@email.com', 'Poland'),
	('Chris', 'chris@email.com', 'Spain'),
	('Jack', 'jack@email.com', 'Spain'),
   ('Kim', 'kim@email.com', 'Vietnam'),
   ('Marco', 'marco@email.com', 'Italy'),
	('Kate', 'kate@email.com', 'Spain'),
	('Nam', 'nam@email.com', 'Vietnam');