About the UPDATE Statement

The UPDATE statement updates (changes the values of) a set of existing table rows.

A simple form of the UPDATE statement has this syntax:

UPDATE table_name
SET column_name = value [, column_name = value]...
[ WHERE condition ];

Each value must be valid for its column_name. Therefore, before you update a column, you must know what its valid values are. To get this information using SQL Developer, see Tutorial: Viewing EMPLOYEES Table Properties and Data. To get this information using SQL*Plus, use this statement:

DESCRIBE table_name;

If you include the WHERE clause, the statement updates column values only in rows that satisfy condition.

The UPDATE statement in the following example updates the value of the SALARY column in the row that was inserted into the EMPLOYEES table in About the INSERT Statement, before the salary of the employee was known.

UPDATE EMPLOYEES
SET SALARY = 8500
WHERE LAST_NAME = 'Keats';

1 row updated.

The UPDATE statement in the following example updates the commission percentage for every employee in department 80.

UPDATE EMPLOYEES
SET COMMISSION_PCT = COMMISSION_PCT + 0.05
WHERE DEPARTMENT_ID = 80;

36 rows updated.