Difference Between VARCHAR() and NARCHAR()

Venkatesh Mahendru — Thu, 05 Sep 2024 23:04:56 +0000

This is my first article 😍, and I will discuss Varchar and NVarhcar 🤔.

Understanding the difference between VARCHAR and NVARCHAR is crucial for optimizing SQL databases, and choosing the right data type can impact storage, performance, and compatibility.

How character get store 🤔

VARCHAR: Stores non-Unicode characters, 1 byte per character
NVARCHAR: Stores Unicode characters, 2 bytes per character. It is better suited for multilingual data.

I know it's going over your head. Let me explain using an example.

Varchar Example

In Varchar I created Users table and inserts the value 'JohnDoe', which is an English string that doesn't require Unicode encoding.

NVARCHAR Example

In Nvarchar created table MultilingualUsers with a Username and inserting the value **N'ジョンド' **into the Username column.
The N prefix before the value indicates that the string is a Unicode string, which allows it to store non-English characters like Japanese, Arabic, or Chinese.

Hope it's clear till now 😍

Lets talk about Performance

Performance
VARCHAR: Better performance due to lower storage requirements for ASCII data

NVARCHAR: Slightly lower performance but essential for multilingual support.

Choose VARCHAR when optimizing for performance in single-language applications.

Happy learning!