---
title: "What is a Pivot table and why its uses in SQL database?"  
description: "What is a Pivot table and why its uses in SQL database?"  
author: "Ashutosh Patel"  
published: 2023-03-22  
updated: 2023-04-12  
canonical: https://www.mindstick.com/forum/157512/what-is-a-pivot-table-and-why-its-uses-in-sql-database  
category: "mssql server"  
tags: ["mssql server", "sql server", "sql"]  
reading_time: 2 minutes  

---

# What is a Pivot table and why its uses in SQL database?

[Explain](https://www.mindstick.com/forum/157854/what-is-system-debugging-explain-some-system-debugging-tools-used-in-modern-computer-systems) about [Pivot table](https://www.mindstick.com/forum/160541/how-to-create-pivot-table-in-sql-server) and how to use it in the [SQL](https://www.mindstick.com/articles/13115/types-of-keys-in-sql-or-oracle-database) [server database](https://www.mindstick.com/forum/156824/what-is-normalization-in-sql-server-database).

## Replies

### Reply by Krishnapriya Rajeev

In SQL, a [pivot](https://www.mindstick.com/articles/1511/pivot-with-dynamic-columns-in-sql-server) [table](https://www.mindstick.com/articles/43918/how-to-design-table-using-bootstrap) is a *data summarization* technique that allows you to transform data from *rows into columns*, and perform aggregate functions on the data. Pivot tables are useful for quickly analyzing large datasets and presenting the results in a more compact and understandable form.

A pivot table typically involves two types of columns: *the pivot column* and *the value column*. The pivot column contains the values that you want to transform into column headings, and the value column contains the values that you want to summarize.

Here's an example of how to create a simple pivot table in SQL:

```plaintext
SELECT *
FROM (
  SELECT product, year, sales
  FROM sales_data
) AS source_table
PIVOT (
  SUM(sales)
  FOR year IN ([2018], [2019], [2020])
) AS pivot_table;
```

In this example, the sales_data table contains columns for product, year, and sales. The PIVOT function is used to transform the year column into column headings and perform the SUM function on the sales column for each product and year combination.

The resulting pivot table will have columns for a product, [2018], [2019], and [2020], with the total sales for each product and year combination in the corresponding cells.

Pivot tables are useful in SQL databases because we can use them to generate reports, create charts and graphs, and perform data analysis.


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