DESCRIBE TABLE
Applies to: 
Databricks SQL Databricks Runtime
Returns the basic metadata information of a table. The metadata information includes column name, column type and column comment. Optionally, you can specify a partition spec or column name to return the metadata pertaining to a partition or column respectively. With Delta tables, not all fields are returned.
Syntax
{ DESC | DESCRIBE } [ TABLE ] [ EXTENDED | FORMATTED ] table_name { [ PARTITION clause ] | [ column_name ] }
Parameters
EXTENDEDorFORMATTEDIf specified display detailed information about the specified columns, including the column statistics collected by the command, and additional metadata information (such as schema qualifier, owner, and access time).
-
Identifies the table to be described. The name may not use a temporal specification. If the table cannot be found Azure Databricks raises a TABLE_OR_VIEW_NOT_FOUND error.
-
An optional parameter directing Databricks SQL to return addition metadata for the named partitions.
-
An optional parameter with the column name that needs to be described. Currently nested columns are not allowed to be specified.
Parameters partition_spec and column_name are mutually exclusive and cannot be specified together.
Examples
-- Creates a table `customer`. Assumes current schema is `salesdb`.
> CREATE TABLE customer(
cust_id INT,
state VARCHAR(20),
name STRING COMMENT 'Short name'
)
USING parquet
PARTITIONED BY (state);
> INSERT INTO customer PARTITION (state = 'AR') VALUES (100, 'Mike');
-- Returns basic metadata information for unqualified table `customer`
> DESCRIBE TABLE customer;
col_name data_type comment
----------------------- --------- ----------
cust_id int null
name string Short name
state string null
# Partition Information
# col_name data_type comment
state string null
-- Returns basic metadata information for qualified table `customer`
> DESCRIBE TABLE salesdb.customer;
col_name data_type comment
----------------------- --------- ----------
cust_id int null
name string Short name
state string null
# Partition Information
# col_name data_type comment
state string null
-- Returns additional metadata such as parent schema, owner, access time etc.
> DESCRIBE TABLE EXTENDED customer;
col_name data_type comment
---------------------------- ------------------------------ ----------
cust_id int null
name string Short name
state string null
# Partition Information
# col_name data_type comment
state string null
# Detailed Table Information
Database default
Table customer
Owner <TABLE OWNER>
Created Time Tue Apr 07 22:56:34 JST 2020
Last Access UNKNOWN
Created By <SPARK VERSION>
Type MANAGED
Provider parquet
Location file:/tmp/salesdb.db/custom...
Serde Library org.apache.hadoop.hive.ql.i...
InputFormat org.apache.hadoop.hive.ql.i...
OutputFormat org.apache.hadoop.hive.ql.i...
Partition Provider Catalog
-- Returns partition metadata such as partitioning column name, column type and comment.
> DESCRIBE TABLE EXTENDED customer PARTITION (state = 'AR');
col_name data_type comment
------------------------------ ------------------------------ ----------
cust_id int null
name string Short name
state string null
# Partition Information
# col_name data_type comment
state string null
# Detailed Partition Inform...
Database default
Table customer
Partition Values [state=AR]
Location file:/tmp/salesdb.db/custom...
Serde Library org.apache.hadoop.hive.ql.i...
InputFormat org.apache.hadoop.hive.ql.i...
OutputFormat org.apache.hadoop.hive.ql.i...
Storage Properties [serialization.format=1, pa...
Partition Parameters {transient_lastDdlTime=1586...
Created Time Tue Apr 07 23:05:43 JST 2020
Last Access UNKNOWN
Partition Statistics 659 bytes
# Storage Information
Location file:/tmp/salesdb.db/custom...
Serde Library org.apache.hadoop.hive.ql.i...
InputFormat org.apache.hadoop.hive.ql.i...
OutputFormat org.apache.hadoop.hive.ql.i...
------------------------------ ------------------------------ ----------
-- Returns the metadata for `name` column.
-- Optional `TABLE` clause is omitted and column is fully qualified.
> DESCRIBE customer salesdb.customer.name;
info_name info_value
--------- ----------
col_name name
data_type string
comment Short name
DESCRIBE DETAIL
DESCRIBE DETAIL [schema_name.]table_name
Return information about schema, partitioning, table size, and so on. For example, for Delta tables, you can see the current reader and writer versions of a table. See Review Delta Lake table details with describe detail for the detail schema.