LIMIT Clause

Specifies the maximum number of result set rows to return.

Syntax

LIMIT { rows | ALL }

Semantics

rows	specifies the maximum number of rows to return
ALL	returns all rows (same as omitting LIMIT)

Notes

When both LIMIT and OFFSET are specified, specified number of rows are skipped before starting to count the rows to be returned.
When using LIMIT, use an ORDER BY clause that includes all columns in the select list. Otherwise the query returns an undefined subset of the result set. For example:

C1	C2
1	2
2	1
1	1
2	2

SELECT *

FROM T

ORDER BY C1

LIMIT 3;

The last row of the result set in this example is undefined in any SQL database but may be consistent enough in other databases for poorly-coded application programs or reports to get the same result set every time. In Vertica however, the distributed nature of the database makes the last row unpredictable, which may cause poorly-coded application programs or reports to get different a result set each time.