LIMIT

ELI5 — The Vibe Check

LIMIT caps how many rows a query returns. If your users table has 1 million rows, you do not want to load all of them at once. LIMIT 10 says 'just give me the first 10.' Essential for pagination.

Real Talk

LIMIT (or TOP in SQL Server, FETCH FIRST in standard SQL) restricts the maximum number of rows returned by a query. It is commonly combined with OFFSET for pagination and with ORDER BY to ensure deterministic results.

Show Me The Code

-- Page 1: first 20 results
SELECT * FROM posts
ORDER BY created_at DESC
LIMIT 20;

When You'll Hear This

"Always add a LIMIT to queries in production so you don't fetch millions of rows." / "LIMIT 1 to get just the most recent record."