Faster alternative in Oracle to SELECT COUNT(*) FROM sometable

Question

I\'ve notice that in Oracle, the query

SELECT COUNT(*) FROM sometable;

is very slow for large tables. It seems like the database it actual

Answer 1

You can create a fast refresh materialized view to store the count.

Example:

create table sometable (
id number(10) not null primary key
, name varchar2(100) not null);

create materialized view log on sometable with rowid including new values;

create materialized view sometable_count
refresh on commit
as
select count(*) count
from   sometable;

insert into sometable values (1,'Raymond');
insert into sometable values (2,'Hans');

commit;

select count from sometable_count; 

It will slow mutations on table sometable a bit but the counting will become a lot faster.

Answer 2

This works great for large tables.

SELECT NUM_ROWS FROM ALL_TABLES WHERE TABLE_NAME = 'TABLE_NAME_IN_UPPERCASE';

For small to medium size tables, following will be ok.

SELECT COUNT(Primary_Key) FROM table_name;

Cheers,

Answer 3

Option 1: Have an index on a non-null column present that can be used for the scan. Or create a function-based index as:

create index idx on t(0);

this can then be scanned to give the count.

Option 2: If you have monitoring turned on then check the monitoring view USER_TAB_MODIFICATIONS and add/subtract the relevant values to the table statistics.

Option 3: For a quick estimate on large tables invoke the SAMPLE clause ... for example ...

SELECT 1000*COUNT(*) FROM sometable SAMPLE(0.1); 

Option 4: Use a materialized view to maintain the count(*). Powerful medicine though.

um ...

Answer 4

You could use COUNT(1) instead

Answer 5

You can have better performance by using the following method:

SELECT COUNT(1) FROM (SELECT /*+FIRST_ROWS*/ column_name 
FROM table_name 
WHERE column_name = 'xxxxx' AND ROWNUM = 1);

Answer 6

If the table has an index on a NOT NULL column the COUNT(*) will use that. Otherwise it is executes a full table scan. Note that the index doesn't have to be UNIQUE it just has to be NOT NULL.

Here is a table...

SQL> desc big23
 Name                                      Null?    Type
 ----------------------------------------- -------- ---------------------------
 PK_COL                                    NOT NULL NUMBER
 COL_1                                              VARCHAR2(30)
 COL_2                                              VARCHAR2(30)
 COL_3                                              NUMBER
 COL_4                                              DATE
 COL_5                                              NUMBER
 NAME                                               VARCHAR2(10)

SQL>

First we'll do a count with no indexes ....

SQL> explain plan for
  2      select count(*) from big23
  3  /

Explained.

SQL> select * from table(dbms_xplan.display)
  2  /
select * from table)dbms_xplan.display)

PLAN_TABLE_OUTPUT
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Plan hash value: 983596667

--------------------------------------------------------------------
| Id  | Operation          | Name  | Rows  | Cost (%CPU)| Time     |
--------------------------------------------------------------------
|   0 | SELECT STATEMENT   |       |     1 |  1618   (1)| 00:00:20 |
|   1 |  SORT AGGREGATE    |       |     1 |            |          |
|   2 |   TABLE ACCESS FULL| BIG23 |   472K|  1618   (1)| 00:00:20 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------

Note

PLAN_TABLE_OUTPUT
--------------------------------------------------------------------
   - dynamic sampling used for this statement

13 rows selected.

SQL>

No we create an index on a column which can contain NULL entries ...

SQL> create index i23 on big23(col_5)
  2  /

Index created.

SQL> delete from plan_table
  2  /

3 rows deleted.

SQL> explain plan for
  2      select count(*) from big23
  3  /

Explained.

SQL> select * from table(dbms_xplan.display)
  2  /

PLAN_TABLE_OUTPUT
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Plan hash value: 983596667

--------------------------------------------------------------------
| Id  | Operation          | Name  | Rows  | Cost (%CPU)| Time     |
--------------------------------------------------------------------
|   0 | SELECT STATEMENT   |       |     1 |  1618   (1)| 00:00:20 |
|   1 |  SORT AGGREGATE    |       |     1 |            |          |
|   2 |   TABLE ACCESS FULL| BIG23 |   472K|  1618   (1)| 00:00:20 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------

Note

PLAN_TABLE_OUTPUT
--------------------------------------------------------------------
   - dynamic sampling used for this statement

13 rows selected.

SQL>

Finally let's build the index on the NOT NULL column ....

SQL> drop index i23
  2  /

Index dropped.

SQL> create index i23 on big23(pk_col)
  2  /

Index created.

SQL> delete from plan_table
  2  /

3 rows deleted.

SQL> explain plan for
  2      select count(*) from big23
  3  /

Explained.

SQL> select * from table(dbms_xplan.display)
  2  /

PLAN_TABLE_OUTPUT
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Plan hash value: 1352920814

----------------------------------------------------------------------
| Id  | Operation             | Name | Rows  | Cost (%CPU)| Time     |
----------------------------------------------------------------------
|   0 | SELECT STATEMENT      |      |     1 |   326   (1)| 00:00:04 |
|   1 |  SORT AGGREGATE       |      |     1 |            |          |
|   2 |   INDEX FAST FULL SCAN| I23  |   472K|   326   (1)| 00:00:04 |
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Note

PLAN_TABLE_OUTPUT
----------------------------------------------------------------------
   - dynamic sampling used for this statement

13 rows selected.

SQL>