SHOW COLUMNS

The SHOW COLUMNS shows details about columns in a table, including each column’s name, type, default value, and whether or not it’s nullable.

Required privileges

The user must have any on the target table.

Synopsis

Parameters

Parameter	Description
table_name	The name of the table for which to show columns.

Response

The following fields are returned for each column.

Field	Description
column_name	The name of the column.
data_type	The of the column.
is_nullable	Whether or not the column accepts NULL. Possible values: true or false.
column_default	The default value for the column, or an expression that evaluates to a default value.
generation_expression	The expression used for a .
indices	The list of that the column is involved in, as an array.
is_hidden	Whether or not the column is hidden. Possible values: true or false.

Examples

Setup

To follow along, run to start a temporary, in-memory cluster with the sample dataset preloaded:

$ cockroach demo

Show columns in a table

> SHOW COLUMNS FROM users;

  column_name | data_type | is_nullable | column_default | generation_expression |         indices          | is_hidden
--------------+-----------+-------------+----------------+-----------------------+--------------------------+------------
  id          | UUID      |    false    | NULL           |                       | {primary,users_name_idx} |   false
  city        | VARCHAR   |    false    | NULL           |                       | {primary,users_name_idx} |   false
  name        | VARCHAR   |    true     | NULL           |                       | {primary,users_name_idx} |   false
  address     | VARCHAR   |    true     | NULL           |                       | {primary}                |   false
  credit_card | VARCHAR   |    true     | NULL           |                       | {primary}                |   false
(5 rows)

Alternatively, within the built-in SQL shell, you can use the \d :

> \d users

  column_name | data_type | is_nullable | column_default | generation_expression |  indices  | is_hidden
+-------------+-----------+-------------+----------------+-----------------------+-----------+-----------+
  id          | UUID      |    false    | NULL           |                       | {primary,users_name_idx} |   false
  city        | VARCHAR   |    false    | NULL           |                       | {primary,users_name_idx} |   false
  name        | VARCHAR   |    true     | NULL           |                       | {primary,users_name_idx} |   false
  address     | VARCHAR   |    true     | NULL           |                       | {primary}                |   false
  credit_card | VARCHAR   |    true     | NULL           |                       | {primary}                |   false
(5 rows)

Show columns with comments

You can use to add comments on a column.

> COMMENT ON COLUMN users.credit_card IS 'This column contains user payment information.';

> SHOW COLUMNS FROM users WITH COMMENT;

  column_name | data_type | is_nullable | column_default | generation_expression |  indices  | is_hidden |                    comment
+-------------+-----------+-------------+----------------+-----------------------+-----------+-----------+------------------------------------------------+
  id          | UUID      |    false    | NULL           |                       | {primary} |   false   | NULL
  city        | VARCHAR   |    false    | NULL           |                       | {primary} |   false   | NULL
  name        | VARCHAR   |    true     | NULL           |                       | {primary} |   false   | NULL
  address     | VARCHAR   |    true     | NULL           |                       | {primary} |   false   | NULL
  credit_card | VARCHAR   |    true     | NULL           |                       | {primary} |   false   | This column contains user payment information.

(5 rows)

See also