Swap Column Values in SQL Server

Introduction (Swap Column Values in SQL Server) : If you are a developer and have learned the programming languages, you might think that you will need a third variable or another temporary storage location to swap the values. Here, as you are a SQL Server DBA, you can simply swap them using a single update statement. Example and Application features : It happens that SQL user might enter incorrect values in the database columns, the next task is to swap those values. Syntax : Syntax to write a query to swap column values in SQL server.

UPDATE [tablename]
SET [col1] = [col2],
   [col2] = [col1]
GO

Let us suppose we need to swap columns in any table in the SQL server. Example - Let us suppose we have below the table "geek_demo".

Select * from geek_demo ;

Output :

LastName	FirstName	City	Email
Ankit	Gupta	Delhi	[email protected]
Babita	Dutta	Noida	[email protected]
Chetan	Jain	Noida	[email protected]
Isha	Sharma	Delhi	[email protected]

Now, to update the column or to swap the column used the following query given below.

UPDATE [geek_demo]
SET [FirstName] = [LastName], 
[LastName] = [FirstName]
GO

Now, let's see the output.

Select * from geek_demo ;

Output :

FirstName	LastName	City	Email
Ankit	Gupta	Delhi	[email protected]
Babita	Dutta	Noida	[email protected]
Chetan	Jain	Noida	[email protected]
Isha	Sharma	Delhi	[email protected]