Difference between CHAR and VARCHAR2 in Oracle

Oracle - Differences between CHAR and VARCHAR2 - Feb 07, 2010 at 14:20 PM by Shuchi Gauri

Differences between CHAR and VARCHAR2 in Oracle.

CHAR is used to store fixed length character strings where as Varchar2 can store variable length character strings. However, for performance sake Char is quit faster than Varchar2.
If we have char name[10] and store “abcde”, then 5 bytes will be filled with null values, whereas in case of varchar2 name[10] 5 bytes will be used and other 5 bytes will be freed.

Oracle - Differences between CHAR and VARCHAR2 - June 27, 2009 at 11:00 AM

Differences between CHAR and VARCHAR2 in Oracle.  

CHAR values have a fixed length. They are padded with space characters to match the specified length.

VARCHAR2 values have a variable length. They are not padded with any characters.

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