VARBINARY data type

The VARBINARY data type is used to store binary data of a specified maximum length (in bytes).

Syntax
VARBINARY [ ( max-length ) ]
Parameters
  • max-length   The maximum length of the value, in bytes. The length must be in the range 1 to 32767. If the length is not specified, then it is 1.

Remarks

During comparisons, VARBINARY values are compared exactly byte for byte. This differs from the CHAR data type, where values are compared using the collation sequence of the database. If one binary string is a prefix of the other, the shorter string is considered to be less than the longer string.

Unlike CHAR values, VARBINARY values are not transformed during character set conversion.

VARBINARY can also be specified as BINARY VARYING. Regardless of which syntax is used, the data type is described as VARBINARY.

See also
Standards and compatibility
  • SQL/2003   Vendor extension.