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LEN (Transact-SQL)

Returns the number of characters of the specified string expression, excluding trailing blanks.

Note

To return the number of bytes used to represent an expression, use the DATALENGTH function.

Topic link iconTransact-SQL Syntax Conventions

Syntax

LEN ( string_expression )

Arguments

  • string_expression
    Is the string expression to be evaluated. string_expression can be a constant, variable, or column of either character or binary data.

Return Types

bigint if expression is of the varchar(max), nvarchar(max) or varbinary(max) data types; otherwise, int.

Examples

The following example selects the number of characters and the data in FirstName for people located in Australia.

USE AdventureWorks2008R2;
GO
SELECT LEN(FirstName) AS Length, FirstName, LastName 
FROM Sales.vIndividualCustomer
WHERE CountryRegionName = 'Australia';
GO