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Anti Join vs Join in SQL: Differences

In SQL, an anti join is a type of JOIN that returns only the rows from one table that do not have matching rows in the other table. It is also sometimes referred to as an “excluding join” or “left anti join”. The opposite of an anti join is an inner join, which returns only the rows that have matching values in both tables.In other words, it returns the complementary set of rows that are not present in the join condition. In this article we learn about Anti Join Vs Join in SQL and differences.

The main difference between a regular join and an anti join is in the way they handle non-matching rows. A regular join combines only the matching rows from both tables, while an anti join excludes the matching rows and returns only the non-matching rows from the left table.

To perform an anti join, you typically use the SQL keyword “LEFT JOIN” along with the keyword “WHERE” and a condition that specifies that the right table’s join column is null. This will return all the rows from the left table that do not have a matching row in the right table.

Anti joins are particularly useful when you want to find records that are missing in one table but present in another. For example, you may want to find all the customers who have not placed an order in a given time period. In this case, you would perform an anti join between the customers table and the orders table to retrieve only the customers who do not have a matching order.

The main difference between an anti join and a regular join is that a regular join returns only the rows that match the join condition, whereas an anti join returns only the rows that do not match the join condition.

For example, suppose we have two tables, “customers” and “orders”, and we want to find all the customers who have not placed an order yet. Using a regular join, we would match the “customer_id” column in both tables and return only the rows where there is a match. However, this would not include the customers who have not placed any orders yet.

Using an anti join, we can return the customers who do not have a matching row in the “orders” table. This is useful when we want to identify the customers who have not placed an order yet and target them with a specific marketing campaign or offer.

In summary, the key difference between a regular join and an anti join is in the way they handle non-matching rows. While a regular join combines only the matching rows, an anti join returns only the non-matching rows from the left table. Anti joins are useful for finding records that are missing in one table but present in another, making them a valuable tool for data analysis in SQL.

About Santosh Kumar Gadagamma

I'm Santosh Gadagamma, an Experienced Software Engineer passionate about sharing knowledge in technologies like Java, C/C++, DBMS/RDBMS, Bootstrap, Big Data, Javascript, Android, Spring, Hibernate, Struts, and all levels of software design, development, deployment, and maintenance. I believe computers are essential for the world's functioning, and I'm committed to helping others learn the skills they need to succeed in tech. My website is a valuable learning tool to help you reach greater heights in your education and career, and I believe that education has no end points.

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