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SUBSTR (legacy)

Returns a substring starting at the character indicated by the <offset> index and including the number of characters defined by the <length>. Character indexing starts from index 1. The <offset> and <length> arguments must be constants.

Use the updated SUBSTRING function instead - this legacy function will be assigned as an alias for the updated behavior in a future release.

Syntax
SUBSTR(<string>, <offset> [, <length>])
Parameter Description
<string> The string to be offset.
<offset> The starting position for the substring. 1 is the first character.
<length> Optional. The number of characters to be returned by the SUBSTR function. If left blank, length by default returns all of the string not specified by the offset parameter.
Example

In the example below, the string is offset by 1 and so the SUBSTR command begins at the first letter, “h”. The <length> of 5 indicates the resulting string should be only five characters long.

SELECT
	SUBSTR('hello world', 1, 5);

Returns: hello

In this next example, there is no <length> provided. This means all characters are included after the <offset> index, which is 7.

SELECT
	SUBSTR('hello world', 7);

Returns: world