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Asked: 2026-05-25T19:31:28+00:00

I have a table in Sql Server 2000 called Table1 with a few columns,

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I have a table in Sql Server 2000 called Table1with a few columns, one of the columns is varchar(255), called ‘Col5’.

The contents if one of the rows in this column is [test].

When I try to test for a part of this string using the LIKE operator, I cannot search for the [ in any way.

This is what I get:

1- trying SELECT * FROM Table1 WHERE Col1 LIKE '%[%' returns NO results.

2- trying SELECT * FROM Table1 WHERE Col1 LIKE '%[t%' returns NO results.

3- trying SELECT * FROM Table1 WHERE Col1 LIKE '%t]%' returns 1 results which as expected.

4- trying SELECT * FROM Table1 WHERE Col1 LIKE '%test%' returns 1 results which as expected.

This is a strange behaviour, is it a bug, what’s going on, any ideas?

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    That character has special meaning in the pattern syntax and needs to be escaped either by defining an explicit escape character

    where Col1 like '%/[%' ESCAPE '/'

    or by using more square brackets

    where Col1 like  '%[[]%'

    In addition to its role in escaping characters it is used in the syntax when defining ranges or sets of characters to match. e.g. LIKE '[0-9]%' to find all values starting with a digit.

    When the range or set is not closed off with a ] it appears as though SQL Server just adds one on to the end. So c like '%[%' is treated as c like '%[%]' and finds all values containing the % character.

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