Row Offset in SQL Server

Question

Is there any way in SQL Server to get the results starting at a given offset? For example, in another type of SQL database, it\'s possible to do:

SELECT * FR         


        

Answer 1

There is OFFSET .. FETCH in SQL Server 2012, but you will need to specify an ORDER BY column.

If you really don't have any explicit column that you could pass as an ORDER BY column (as others have suggested), then you can use this trick:

SELECT * FROM MyTable 
ORDER BY @@VERSION 
OFFSET 50 ROWS FETCH NEXT 25 ROWS ONLY

... or

SELECT * FROM MyTable 
ORDER BY (SELECT 0)
OFFSET 50 ROWS FETCH NEXT 25 ROWS ONLY

We're using it in jOOQ when users do not explicitly specify an order. This will then produce pretty random ordering without any additional costs.