SQL and PL/SQL reserved words

I found this tip from forum discussing about Oracle’s reserved words. You can use it to quickly view reserved words for both SQL and PL/SQL.

SQL> help reserved

RESERVED WORDS (PL/SQL)
-----------------------

PL/SQL Reserved Words have special meaning in PL/SQL, and may not be used
for identifier names (unless enclosed in "quotes").

An asterisk (*) indicates words are also SQL Reserved Words.

ALL*            DESC*           JAVA            PACKAGE         SUBTYPE
ALTER*          DISTINCT*       LEVEL*          PARTITION       SUCCESSFUL*
AND*            DO              LIKE*           PCTFREE*        SUM
ANY*            DROP*           LIMITED         PLS_INTEGER     SYNONYM*
ARRAY           ELSE*           LOCK*           POSITIVE        SYSDATE*
AS*             ELSIF           LONG*           POSITIVEN       TABLE*
ASC*            END             LOOP            PRAGMA          THEN*
AT              EXCEPTION       MAX             PRIOR*          TIME
AUTHID          EXCLUSIVE*      MIN             PRIVATE         TIMESTAMP
AVG             EXECUTE         MINUS*          PROCEDURE       TIMEZONE_ABBR
BEGIN           EXISTS*         MINUTE          PUBLIC*         TIMEZONE_HOUR
BETWEEN*        EXIT            MLSLABEL*       RAISE           TIMEZONE_MINUTE
BINARY_INTEGER  EXTENDS         MOD             RANGE           TIMEZONE_REGION
BODY            EXTRACT         MODE*           RAW*            TO*
BOOLEAN         FALSE           MONTH           REAL            TRIGGER*
BULK            FETCH           NATURAL         RECORD          TRUE
BY*             FLOAT*          NATURALN        REF             TYPE
CHAR*           FOR*            NEW             RELEASE         UI
CHAR_BASE       FORALL          NEXTVAL         RETURN          UNION*
CHECK*          FROM*           NOCOPY          REVERSE         UNIQUE*
CLOSE           FUNCTION        NOT*            ROLLBACK        UPDATE*
CLUSTER*        GOTO            NOWAIT*         ROW*            USE
COALESCE        GROUP*          NULL*           ROWID*          USER*
COLLECT         HAVING*         NULLIF          ROWNUM*         VALIDATE*
COMMENT*        HEAP            NUMBER*         ROWTYPE         VALUES*
COMMIT          HOUR            NUMBER_BASE     SAVEPOINT       VARCHAR*
COMPRESS*       IF              OCIROWID        SECOND          VARCHAR2*
CONNECT*        IMMEDIATE*      OF*             SELECT*         VARIANCE
CONSTANT        IN*             ON*             SEPERATE        VIEW*
CREATE*         INDEX*          OPAQUE          SET*            WHEN
CURRENT*        INDICATOR       OPEN            SHARE*          WHENEVER*
CURRVAL         INSERT*         OPERATOR        SMALLINT*       WHERE*
CURSOR          INTEGER*        OPTION*         SPACE           WHILE
DATE*           INTERFACE       OR*             SQL             WITH*
DAY             INTERSECT*      ORDER*          SQLCODE         WORK
DECIMAL*        INTERVAL        ORGANIZATION    SQLERRM         WRITE
DECLARE         INTO*           OTHERS          START*          YEAR
DEFAULT*        IS*             OUT             STDDEV          ZONE
DELETE*         ISOLATION

RESERVED WORDS (SQL)
--------------------

SQL Reserved Words have special meaning in SQL, and may not be used for
identifier names unless enclosed in "quotes".

An asterisk (*) indicates words are also ANSI Reserved Words.

Oracle prefixes implicitly generated schema object and subobject names
with "SYS_". To avoid name resolution conflict, Oracle discourages you
from prefixing your schema object and subobject names with "SYS_".

ACCESS          DEFAULT*         INTEGER*        ONLINE          START
ADD*            DELETE*          INTERSECT*      OPTION*         SUCCESSFUL
ALL*            DESC*            INTO*           OR*             SYNONYM
ALTER*          DISTINCT*        IS*             ORDER*          SYSDATE
AND*            DROP*            LEVEL*          PCTFREE         TABLE*
ANY*            ELSE*            LIKE*           PRIOR*          THEN*
AS*             EXCLUSIVE        LOCK            PRIVILEGES*     TO*
ASC*            EXISTS           LONG            PUBLIC*         TRIGGER
AUDIT           FILE             MAXEXTENTS      RAW             UID
BETWEEN*        FLOAT*           MINUS           RENAME          UNION*
BY*             FOR*             MLSLABEL        RESOURCE        UNIQUE*
CHAR*           FROM*            MODE            REVOKE*         UPDATE*
CHECK*          GRANT*           MODIFY          ROW             USER*
CLUSTER         GROUP*           NOAUDIT         ROWID           VALIDATE
COLUMN          HAVING*          NOCOMPRESS      ROWNUM          VALUES*
COMMENT         IDENTIFIED       NOT*            ROWS*           VARCHAR*
COMPRESS        IMMEDIATE*       NOWAIT          SELECT*         VARCHAR2
CONNECT*        IN*              NULL*           SESSION*        VIEW*
CREATE*         INCREMENT        NUMBER          SET*            WHENEVER*
CURRENT*        INDEX            OF*             SHARE           WHERE
DATE*           INITIAL          OFFLINE         SIZE*           WITH*
DECIMAL*        INSERT*          ON*             SMALLINT*

4 thoughts on “SQL and PL/SQL reserved words”

  1. Hi,

    I have started learning Oracle recently and needed little help. Here is my query:

    Is there a way in which we can get help on syntax for reserved words?

    For example if I would like to know how to use SHOW in SQL*PLUS I would use HELP SHOW. Similarly if I would like to know how should SELECT be used, how can I find it using HELP? I used below command in SQL*PLUS to get a list of Reserved words in SQL:

    HELP reserved words (SQL)

    Thanks,
    Shakti

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Scroll to Top