The OR Operator
Let’s now look at the OR operator. The AND operator meant that all conditions must evaluate to true for the row to be selected. The OR operator means that the row will be selected if any of the conditions are determined to be true.
Here’s an example, taken from the same table:
SELECT CustomerName, QuantityPurchased, PricePerItem FROM Purchases WHERE QuantityPurchased > 8 OR PricePerItem > 3
This SELECT returns this data:
CustomerName |
QuantityPurchased |
PricePerItem |
Sandy Harris |
10 |
1.25 |
James Turban |
5 |
4.00 |
Why are the rows for Sandy Harris and James Turban displayed, and not the row for Kim Chiang? The row for Sandy Harris is selected because it meets the requirements of the first condition (QuantityPurchased > 8). It doesn’t matter that the second condition (PricePerItem > 3) isn’t true, because only one condition needs to be true for an OR condition.
Likewise, the row for James Turban is selected because the second condition (PricePerItem > 3) is true for that row. The row for Kim Chiang isn’t selected because it doesn’t satisfy either of the two conditions.