DROP LOGIN (Transact-SQL)

Applies to: SQL Server Azure SQL Database Azure SQL Managed Instance Azure Synapse Analytics Analytics Platform System (PDW)

Removes a SQL Server login account.

Transact-SQL syntax conventions

Syntax

DROP LOGIN login_name  

Note

To view Transact-SQL syntax for SQL Server 2014 (12.x) and earlier versions, see Previous versions documentation.

Arguments

login_name
Specifies the name of the login to be dropped.

Remarks

A login cannot be dropped while it is logged in. A login that owns any securable, server-level object, or SQL Server Agent job cannot be dropped.

You can drop a login to which database users are mapped; however, this will create orphaned users. For more information, see Troubleshoot Orphaned Users (SQL Server).

In SQL Database, login data required to authenticate a connection and server-level firewall rules are temporarily cached in each database. This cache is periodically refreshed. To force a refresh of the authentication cache and make sure that a database has the latest version of the logins table, execute DBCC FLUSHAUTHCACHE (Transact-SQL).

Permissions

Requires ALTER ANY LOGIN permission on the server.

Examples

A. Dropping a login

The following example drops the login WilliJo.

DROP LOGIN WilliJo;  
GO 

See Also

CREATE LOGIN (Transact-SQL)
ALTER LOGIN (Transact-SQL)
EVENTDATA (Transact-SQL)