Equals(=) vs. LIKE

Question

When using SQL, are there any benefits of using = in a WHERE clause instead of LIKE?

Without any special operators, LIKE

Answer 1

The equals (=) operator is a "comparison operator compares two values for equality." In other words, in an SQL statement, it won't return true unless both sides of the equation are equal. For example:

SELECT * FROM Store WHERE Quantity = 200;

The LIKE operator "implements a pattern match comparison" that attempts to match "a string value against a pattern string containing wild-card characters." For example:

SELECT * FROM Employees WHERE Name LIKE 'Chris%';

LIKE is generally used only with strings and equals (I believe) is faster. The equals operator treats wild-card characters as literal characters. The difference in results returned are as follows:

SELECT * FROM Employees WHERE Name = 'Chris';

And

SELECT * FROM Employees WHERE Name LIKE 'Chris';

Would return the same result, though using LIKE would generally take longer as its a pattern match. However,

SELECT * FROM Employees WHERE Name = 'Chris%';

And

SELECT * FROM Employees WHERE Name LIKE 'Chris%';

Would return different results, where using "=" results in only results with "Chris%" being returned and the LIKE operator will return anything starting with "Chris".

Hope that helps. Some good info can be found here.