SQL Insert

The INSERT statement allows you to add data to a table.

Up until now, this tutorial has covered the SELECT statement and variations on it. We are now about to learn a new statement — the INSERT statement.

The SQL INSERT command allows you to insert a record into a table in your database. As with the SELECT syntax, the INSERT syntax is quite straight forward.

SQL statement

Source Table

IndividualId	FirstName	LastName	UserName
1	Fred	Flinstone	freddo
2	Homer	Simpson	homey
3	Homer	Brown	notsofamous
4	Ozzy	Ozzbourne	sabbath
5	Homer	Gain	noplacelike

Result

Now if we do a SELECT on the Individual table, we can see the new record added to the bottom of the result set.

IndividualId	FirstName	LastName	UserName
1	Fred	Flinstone	freddo
2	Homer	Simpson	homey
3	Homer	Brown	notsofamous
4	Ozzy	Ozzbourne	sabbath
5	Homer	Gain	noplacelike
6	Benny	Hill	hillbenny

See — nothing to it!

Now, it's important to note that the INSERT statement is used only when you want to add a new record to the table. If you want to update an existing record, use an UPDATE statement. The UPDATE command is described in the next lesson.