TiDB Basic Features

This document introduces the basic features of TiDB.

Data types

• Numeric types: BIT, BOOL|BOOLEAN, SMALLINT, MEDIUMINT, INT|INTEGER, BIGINT, FLOAT, DOUBLE, DECIMAL.

• Date and time types: DATE, TIME, DATETIME, TIMESTAMP, YEAR.

• String types: CHAR, VARCHAR, TEXT, TINYTEXT, MEDIUMTEXT, LONGTEXT, BINARY, VARBINARY, BLOB, TINYBLOB, MEDIUMBLOB, LONGBLOB, ENUM, SET.

• The JSON type.

Operators

• Arithmetic operators, bit operators, comparison operators, logical operators, date and time operators, and so on.

Character sets and collations

• Character sets: UTF8, UTF8MB4, BINARY, ASCII, LATIN1.

• Collations: UTF8MB4_GENERAL_CI, UTF8MB4_GENERAL_BIN, UTF8_GENERAL_CI, UTF8_GENERAL_BIN, BINARY.

Functions

• Control flow functions, string functions, date and time functions, bit functions, data type conversion functions, data encryption and decryption functions, compression and decompression functions, information functions, JSON functions, aggregation functions, window functions, and so on.

SQL statements

• Fully supports standard Data Definition Language (DDL) statements, such as CREATE, DROP, ALTER, RENAME, TRUNCATE, and so on.

• Fully supports standard Data Manipulation Language (DML) statements, such as INSERT, REPLACE, SELECT, subqueries, UPDATE, LOAD DATA, and so on.

• Fully supports standard transactional and locking statements, such as START TRANSACTION, COMMIT, ROLLBACK, SET TRANSACTION, and so on.

• Fully supports standard database administration statements, such as SHOW, SET, and so on.

• Fully supports standard utility statements, such as DESCRIBE, EXPLAIN, USE, and so on.

• Fully supports the GROUP BY and ORDER BY clauses.

• Fully supports the standard LEFT OUTER JOIN and RIGHT OUTER JOIN SQL statements.

• Fully supports the standard SQL table and column aliases.

Partitioning

• Supports Range partitioning
• Supports Hash partitioning

Views

• Supports general views

Constraints

• Supports non-empty constraints
• Supports primary key constraints
• Supports unique constraints

Security

• Supports privilege management based on RBAC (role-based access control)
• Supports password management
• Supports communication and data encryption
• Supports IP allowlist
• Supports audit

Tools

• Supports fast backup
• Supports data migration from MySQL to TiDB using tools
• Supports deploying and maintaining TiDB using tools