If you want just a first selected row, you can: select fname from MyTbl where rownum = 1 You can also use analytic functions to order and take the top x: select max(fname) over (rank() order by some_factor) from MyTbl
For this you can use limit select * from scores order by score desc limit 10 If performance is important (when is it not 😉 look for an index on score. Starting with version 8.4, you can also use the standard (SQL:2008) fetch first select * from scores order by score desc fetch first 10 … Read more
You can use a subquery for this like select * from ( select * from emp order by sal desc ) where ROWNUM <= 5; Have also a look at the topic On ROWNUM and limiting results at Oracle/AskTom for more information. Update: To limit the result with both lower and upper bounds things get … Read more