MySQL LIKE Operator

Using MySQL LIKE operator you can search based on patterns. It is used in the WHERE clause in SELECT statement.

This basically use two characters for using the MySQL LIKE operator:

‘%’ – allows you to match zero or more characters
‘_’ – allows you to match any single character

For searching the first character starts with ‘a’ like andy, arnold:
SELECT * FROM users WHERE name LIKE ‘a%’;

For searching the last character ends with ‘ck’ like jack, drack:
SELECT * FROM users WHERE name LIKE ‘%ck’;

For searching the middle character with ‘ac’ like jack, drack:
SELECT * FROM users WHERE name LIKE ‘%ac%’;

For searching the name whose name starts with P and ends with m like pom, pim:
SELECT * FROM users WHERE name LIKE ‘p_m’;

You can also use NOT operator to like for exception:
SELECT * FROM users WHERE name NOT LIKE ‘a%’;