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Asked: 2026-05-10T16:37:48+00:00

In SQL Server 2005, are there any disadvantages to making all character fields nvarchar(MAX)

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In SQL Server 2005, are there any disadvantages to making all character fields nvarchar(MAX) rather than specifying a length explicitly, e.g. nvarchar(255)? (Apart from the obvious one that you aren’t able to limit the field length at the database level)

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  1. Same question was asked on MSDN Forums:

    From the original post (much more information there):

    When you store data to a VARCHAR(N) column, the values are physically stored in the same way. But when you store it to a VARCHAR(MAX) column, behind the screen the data is handled as a TEXT value. So there is some additional processing needed when dealing with a VARCHAR(MAX) value. (only if the size exceeds 8000)

    VARCHAR(MAX) or NVARCHAR(MAX) is considered as a ‘large value type’. Large value types are usually stored ‘out of row’. It means that the data row will have a pointer to another location where the ‘large value’ is stored…

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