The SQL DELETE Statement

The DELETE statement is used to delete existing records in a table.

DELETE Syntax

DELETE FROM table_name WHERE condition;

SQL DELETE Example

The following SQL statement deletes the customer "Alfreds Futterkiste" from the "Customers" table:

Example

DELETE FROM Customers WHERE CustomerName='Alfreds Futterkiste';

Delete All Records

It is possible to delete all rows in a table without deleting the table. This means that the table structure, attributes, and indexes will be intact:

DELETE FROM table_name;

The following SQL statement deletes all rows in the "Customers" table, without deleting the table:

Example

DELETE FROM Customers;

Example (MySQLi Object-oriented)

<?php
$servername = "localhost";
$username = "username";
$password = "password";
$dbname = "myDB";

// Create connection
$conn = new mysqli($servername, $username, $password, $dbname);
// Check connection
if ($conn->connect_error) {
  die("Connection failed: " . $conn->connect_error);
}

// sql to delete a record
$sql = "DELETE FROM MyGuests WHERE id=3";

if ($conn->query($sql) === TRUE) {
  echo "Record deleted successfully";
} else {
  echo "Error deleting record: " . $conn->error;
}

$conn->close();
?>

Example (MySQLi Procedural)

<?php
$servername = "localhost";
$username = "username";
$password = "password";
$dbname = "myDB";

// Create connection
$conn = mysqli_connect($servername, $username, $password, $dbname);
// Check connection
if (!$conn) {
  die("Connection failed: " . mysqli_connect_error());
}

// sql to delete a record
$sql = "DELETE FROM MyGuests WHERE id=3";

if (mysqli_query($conn, $sql)) {
  echo "Record deleted successfully";
} else {
  echo "Error deleting record: " . mysqli_error($conn);
}

mysqli_close($conn);
?>

Example (PDO)

<?php
$servername = "localhost";
$username = "username";
$password = "password";
$dbname = "myDBPDO";

try {
  $conn = new PDO("mysql:host=$servername;dbname=$dbname", $username, $password);
  // set the PDO error mode to exception
  $conn->setAttribute(PDO::ATTR_ERRMODE, PDO::ERRMODE_EXCEPTION);

  // sql to delete a record
  $sql = "DELETE FROM MyGuests WHERE id=3";

  // use exec() because no results are returned
  $conn->exec($sql);
  echo "Record deleted successfully";
} catch(PDOException $e) {
  echo $sql . "<br>" . $e->getMessage();
}

$conn = null;
?>