How to find columns with a specific name in a SQL database?
Jul 07, 2025 am 02:08 AMTo find columns with specific names in SQL databases, it can be achieved through system information schema or the database comes with its own metadata table. 1. Use INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS query to most SQL databases, such as MySQL, PostgreSQL and SQL Server, and match them through SELECT TABLE_NAME, COLUMN_NAME and WHERE COLUMN_NAME LIKE or =; 2. A specific database can query system tables or views, such as SQL Server uses sys.columns to combine sys.tables for JOIN query, and PostgreSQL can add schema filtering conditions through information_schema.columns; 3. To improve efficiency, a database name or schema name can be added as filtering conditions in the query to narrow the search scope. The syntax of different databases is slightly different, but the core idea is the same: use system tables or information patterns to retrieve metadata.
Finding columns with specific names in SQL databases is usually for locating data, debugging queries, or performing structural analysis. The most direct way is to implement it through the system information mode ( INFORMATION_SCHEMA
) or the metadata tables that come with the database.

Query with INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS
This is one of the most general approaches and is suitable for most databases that support SQL standards, such as MySQL, PostgreSQL, and SQL Server.

SELECT TABLE_NAME, COLUMN_NAME FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS WHERE COLUMN_NAME LIKE '%your_column_name%';
-
TABLE_NAME
will tell you which table this column belongs to. - Use
LIKE
to fuzzy match column names, such as adding wildcard%
to find columns containing a keyword. - If you know the exact column name, you can change
LIKE
=
.
For example:
SELECT TABLE_NAME, COLUMN_NAME FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS WHERE COLUMN_NAME = 'user_id';
Query system tables or views (for specific databases)
Some databases provide more efficient system tables or views to query metadata, such as PostgreSQL's pg_attribute
or SQL Server's sys.columns
.

In SQL Server, you can write this:
SELECT t.name AS table_name, c.name AS column_name FROM sys.columns c JOIN sys.tables t ON c.object_id = t.object_id WHERE c.name LIKE '%your_column_name%';
You can use in PostgreSQL:
SELECT column_name, table_name FROM information_schema.columns WHERE column_name LIKE '%your_column_name%' AND table_schema = 'public'; -- optional, limited schema
Add database or schema filtering conditions
If you have multiple schemas in your database or just want to check the columns under a certain database, you can add filtering conditions to the query:
- Add in the
INFORMATION_SCHEMA
query:
AND TABLE_SCHEMA = 'your_database_name'
- In SQL Server, you can also filter through
sys.schemas
table join.
Doing so can narrow the search scope and improve query efficiency.
Basically these are the methods. The syntax may vary slightly between different databases, but the overall idea is consistent: look up metadata through system tables or information patterns. When using it, just need to replace the column name and database name.
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