MySQL Number Format Function

MySQL doesn’t have a built-in number format function like some other databases or programming languages. However, you can achieve number formatting in MySQL by using SQL functions and string concatenation.

If you want to format a number with thousands separators (e.g., comma-separated), you can use the FORMAT function in MySQL, which is designed to format numbers as strings with a specified number of decimal places and thousands separators.

Here’s the basic syntax for the FORMAT function:

FORMAT(number, decimal_places)

• number: The number you want to format.
• decimal_places: The number of decimal places to include in the formatted result.

For example, to format a number with two decimal places and thousands separators:

SELECT FORMAT(1234567.891, 2);

This query will return ‘1,234,567.89’, where the number is formatted with two decimal places and thousands separators.

Keep in mind that the FORMAT function returns a string, not a numeric value, so the result can’t be used for further numeric calculations.

If you want to format numbers differently, such as adding currency symbols or other custom formatting, you’ll need to use string concatenation and functions like CONCAT. Here’s an example of adding a dollar sign and formatting to two decimal places:

SELECT CONCAT('$', FORMAT(1234567.891, 2));

This query will return ‘$1,234,567.89’.

It’s important to note that MySQL’s FORMAT function is available in MySQL 8.0 and later versions. If you’re using an older version of MySQL, you may need to implement custom formatting logic or consider formatting numbers in your application code instead.