SET Operators in SQL

SET operators are special type of operators which are used to combine the result of two
queries.

Operators covered under SET operators are:

1. UNION
2. UNION ALL
3. INTERSECT
4. MINUS

There are certain rules which must be followed to perform operations using SET
operators in SQL. Rules are as follows:

1. The number and order of columns must be the same.

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Let us see each of the SET operators in more detail with the help of examples.

All the examples will be written using the MySQL database.

Consider we have the following tables with the given data.

Table 1: t_employees

ID Name Department Salary Year_of_Experience

1 Aakash Singh Development 72000 2

2 Abhishek Pawar Production 45000 1

3 Pranav Deshmukh HR 59900 3

4 Shubham Mahale Accounts 57000 2

5 Sunil Kulkarni Development 87000 3

6 Bhushan Wagh R&D 75000 2

7 Paras Jaiswal Marketing 32000 1

Table 2: t2_employees

ID Name Department Salary Year_of_Experience

1 Prashant Wagh R&D 49000 1

2 Abhishek Pawar Production 45000 1

3 Gautam Jain Development 56000 4

4 Shubham Mahale Accounts 57000 2

5 Rahul Thakur Production 76000 4

6 Bhushan Wagh R&D 75000 2

7 Anand Singh Marketing 28000 1

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Table 3: t_students

ID Name Hometown Percentage Favourite_Subject

1 Soniya Jain Udaipur 89 Physics

2 Harshada Sharma Kanpur 92 Chemistry

3 Anuja Rajput Jaipur 78 History

4 Pranali Singh Nashik 88 Geography

5 Renuka Deshmukh Panipat 90 Biology

6 Swati Kumari Faridabad 93 English

7 Prachi Jaiswal Gurugram 96 Hindi

Table 4: t2_students

ID Name Hometown Percentage Favourite_Subject

1 Soniya Jain Udaipur 89 Physics

2 Ishwari Dixit Delhi 86 Hindi

3 Anuja Rajput Jaipur 78 History

4 Pakhi Arora Surat 70 Sanskrit

5 Renuka Deshmukh Panipat 90 Biology

6 Jayshree Patel Pune 91 Maths

7 Prachi Jaiswal Gurugram 96 Hindi

1. UNION:
o UNION will be used to combine the result of two select statements.

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 o Duplicate rows will be eliminated from the results obtained after performing the
UNION operation.

Example 1:

Write a query to perform union between the table t_employees and the table
t2_employees.

Query:

1. mysql> SELECT *FROM t_employees UNION SELECT *FROM t2_employees;

Here, in a single query, we have written two SELECT queries. The first SELECT query will
fetch the records from the t_employees table and perform a UNION operation with the
records fetched by the second SELECT query from the t2_employees table.

You will get the following output:

ID Name Department Salary Year_of_Experience

1 Aakash Singh Development 72000 2

2 Abhishek Pawar Production 45000 1

3 Pranav Deshmukh HR 59900 3

4 Shubham Mahale Accounts 57000 2

5 Sunil Kulkarni Development 87000 3

6 Bhushan Wagh R&D 75000 2

7 Paras Jaiswal Marketing 32000 1

1 Prashant Wagh R&D 49000 1

3 Gautam Jain Development 56000 4

5 Rahul Thakur Production 76000 4

7 Anand Singh Marketing 28000 1

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 Since we have performed union operation between both the tables, so only the records
from the first and second table are displayed except for the duplicate records.

Example 2:

Write a query to perform union between the table t_students and the table t2_students.

Query:

1. mysql> SELECT *FROM t_students UNION SELECT *FROM t2_students;

Here, in a single query, we have written two SELECT queries. The first SELECT query will
fetch the records from the t_students table and perform a UNION operation with the
records fetched by the second SELECT query from the t2_students table.

You will get the following output:

ID Name Department Salary Year_of_Experience

1 Soniya Jain Udaipur 89 Physics

2 Harshada Sharma Kanpur 92 Chemistry

3 Anuja Rajput Jaipur 78 History

4 Pranali Singh Nashik 88 Geography

5 Renuka Deshmukh Panipat 90 Biology

6 Swati Kumari Faridabad 93 English

7 Prachi Jaiswal Gurugram 96 Hindi

2 Ishwari Dixit Delhi 86 Hindi

4 Pakhi Arora Surat 70 Sanskrit

6 Jayshree Patel Pune 91 Maths

Since we have performed union operation between both the tables, so only the records
from the first and second table are displayed except for the duplicate records.

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 2. UNION ALL
o This operator combines all the records from both the queries.
o Duplicate rows will be not be eliminated from the results obtained after
performing the UNION ALL operation.

Example 1:

Write a query to perform union all operation between the table t_employees and the
table t2_employees.

Query:

1. mysql> SELECT *FROM t_employees UNION ALL SELECT *FROM t2_employees;

Here, in a single query, we have written two SELECT queries. The first SELECT query will
fetch the records from the t_employees table and perform UNION ALL operation with
the records fetched by the second SELECT query from the t2_employees table.

You will get the following output:

ID Name Department Salary Year_of_Experience

1 Aakash Singh Development 72000 2

2 Abhishek Pawar Production 45000 1

3 Pranav Deshmukh HR 59900 3

4 Shubham Mahale Accounts 57000 2

5 Sunil Kulkarni Development 87000 3

6 Bhushan Wagh R&D 75000 2

7 Paras Jaiswal Marketing 32000 1

1 Prashant Wagh R&D 49000 1

2 Abhishek Pawar Production 45000 1

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 3 Gautam Jain Development 56000 4

4 Shubham Mahale Accounts 57000 2

5 Rahul Thakur Production 76000 4

6 Bhushan Wagh R&D 75000 2

7 Anand Singh Marketing 28000 1

Since we have performed union all operation between both the tables, so all the records
from the first and second table are displayed, including the duplicate records.

Example 2:

Write a query to perform union all operation between the table t_students and the table
t2_students.

Query:

1. mysql> SELECT *FROM t_students UNION ALL SELECT *FROM t2_students;

Here, in a single query, we have written two SELECT queries. The first SELECT query will
fetch the records from the t_students table and perform UNION ALL operation with the
records fetched by the second SELECT query from the t2_students table.

You will get the following output:

ID Name Hometown Percentage Favourite_Subject

1 Soniya Jain Udaipur 89 Physics

2 Harshada Sharma Kanpur 92 Chemistry

3 Anuja Rajput Jaipur 78 History

4 Pranali Singh Nashik 88 Geography

5 Renuka Deshmukh Panipat 90 Biology

6 Swati Kumari Faridabad 93 English

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 7 Prachi Jaiswal Gurugram 96 Hindi

1 Soniya Jain Udaipur 89 Physics

2 Ishwari Dixit Delhi 86 Hindi

3 Anuja Rajput Jaipur 78 History

4 Pakhi Arora Surat 70 Sanskrit

5 Renuka Deshmukh Panipat 90 Biology

6 Jayshree Patel Pune 91 Maths

7 Prachi Jaiswal Gurugram 96 Hindi

Since we have performed union all operation between both the tables, so all the records
from the first and second table are displayed, including the duplicate records.

3. INTERSECT:
o It is used to combine two SELECT statements, but it only returns the records
which are common from both SELECT statements.

Example 1:

Write a query to perform intersect operation between the table t_employees and the
table t2_employees.

Query:

1. mysql> SELECT *FROM t_employees INTERSECT SELECT *FROM t2_employees;

Here, in a single query, we have written two SELECT queries. The first SELECT query will
fetch the records from the t_employees table and perform INTERSECT operation with
the records fetched by the second SELECT query from the t2_employees table.

You will get the following output:

ID Name Hometown Percentage Favourite_Subject

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 2 Abhishek Pawar Production 45000 1

4 Shubham Mahale Accounts 57000 2

6 Bhushan Wagh R&D 75000 2

Since we have performed intersect operation between both the tables, so only the
common records from both the tables are displayed.

Example 2:

Write a query to perform intersect operation between the table t_students and the table
t2_students.

Query:

1. mysql> SELECT *FROM t_students INTERSECT SELECT *FROM t2_students;

Here, in a single query, we have written two SELECT queries. The first SELECT query will
fetch the records from the t_students table and perform a UNION operation with the
records fetched by the second SELECT query from the t2_students table.

You will get the following output:

ID Name Hometown Percentage Favourite_Subject

1 Soniya Jain Udaipur 89 Physics

3 Anuja Rajput Jaipur 78 History

5 Renuka Deshmukh Panipat 90 Biology

7 Prachi Jaiswal Gurugram 96 Hindi

Since we have performed intersect operation between both the tables, so only the
common records from both the tables are displayed.

4. MINUS

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 o It displays the rows which are present in the first query but absent in the second
query with no duplicates.

Example 1:

Write a query to perform a minus operation between the table t_employees and the
table t2_employees.

Query:

1. mysql> SELECT *FROM t_employees MINUS SELECT *FROM t2_employees;

Here, in a single query, we have written two SELECT queries. The first SELECT query will
fetch the records from the t_employees table and perform MINUS operation with the
records fetched by the second SELECT query from the t2_employees table.

You will get the following output:

ID Name Department Salary Year_of_Experience

1 Aakash Singh Development 72000 2

3 Pranav Deshmukh HR 59900 3

5 Sunil Kulkarni Development 87000 3

7 Paras Jaiswal Marketing 32000 1

Since we have performed Minus operation between both the tables, so only the
unmatched records from both the tables are displayed.

Example 2:

Write a query to perform a minus operation between the table t_students and the table
t2_students.

Query:

1. mysql> SELECT *FROM t_students MINUS SELECT *FROM t2_students;

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Here, in a single query, we have written two SELECT queries. The first SELECT query will
fetch the records from the t_employees table and perform a UNION operation with the
records fetched by the second SELECT query from the t2_employees table.

You will get the following output:

ID Name Hometown Percentage Favourite_Subject

2 Harshada Sharma Kanpur 92 Chemistry

4 Pranali Singh Nashik 88 Geography

6 Swati Kumari Faridabad 93 English

Since we have performed a minus operation between both the tables, so only the
Unmatched records from both the tables are displayed.

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