SQL “between” not inclusive

Question

I have a query like this:

SELECT * FROM Cases WHERE created_at BETWEEN \'2013-05-01\' AND \'2013-05-01\'

But this gives no results even tho

Answer 1

It is inclusive. You are comparing datetimes to dates. The second date is interpreted as midnight when the day starts.

One way to fix this is:

SELECT *
FROM Cases
WHERE cast(created_at as date) BETWEEN '2013-05-01' AND '2013-05-01'

Another way to fix it is with explicit binary comparisons

SELECT *
FROM Cases
WHERE created_at >= '2013-05-01' AND created_at < '2013-05-02'

Aaron Bertrand has a long blog entry on dates (here), where he discusses this and other date issues.

Answer 2

You need to do one of these two options:

1. Include the time component in your between condition: ... where created_at between '2013-05-01 00:00:00' and '2013-05-01 23:59:59' (not recommended... see the last paragraph)
2. Use inequalities instead of between. Notice that then you'll have to add one day to the second value: ... where (created_at >= '2013-05-01' and created_at < '2013-05-02')

My personal preference is the second option. Also, Aaron Bertrand has a very clear explanation on why it should be used.

Answer 3

Just use the time stamp as date:

SELECT * FROM Cases WHERE date(created_at)='2013-05-01' 

Answer 4

cast(created_at as date)

That will work only in 2008 and newer versions of SQL Server

If you are using older version then use

convert(varchar, created_at, 101)

Answer 5

I find that the best solution to comparing a datetime field to a date field is the following:

DECLARE @StartDate DATE = '5/1/2013', 
        @EndDate   DATE = '5/1/2013' 

SELECT * 
FROM   cases 
WHERE  Datediff(day, created_at, @StartDate) <= 0 
       AND Datediff(day, created_at, @EndDate) >= 0 

This is equivalent to an inclusive between statement as it includes both the start and end date as well as those that fall between.

Answer 6

You can use the date() function which will extract the date from a datetime and give you the result as inclusive date:

SELECT * FROM Cases WHERE date(created_at)='2013-05-01' AND '2013-05-01'