Cloud

DESCRIBE

The DESCRIBE statement displays columns of a table or lists tables in a database.

Syntax

DESCRIBE DATABASE;
DESCRIBE TABLE table_name;
DESCRIBE TABLE catalog_name=>table_name;
DESCRIBE REDPANDA CATALOG catalog_name;
DESCRIBE ICEBERG CATALOG catalog_name;

  • table_name: Name of the table to describe.

  • catalog_name⇒table_name: Describes a table that is mapped to a Redpanda topic through a catalog.

  • catalog_name (after REDPANDA CATALOG): Name of a Redpanda catalog. Lists the tables and topic mappings in that catalog.

  • catalog_name (after ICEBERG CATALOG): Name of an Iceberg catalog. Lists the catalog’s connection details, including its REST endpoint and warehouse.

This statement is available to all users with the USAGE privilege on the schema where the table is located.

Examples

Describe a table

To show the columns of the part table, run the query:

DESCRIBE TABLE part;

The query returns:

+----------------+------------+-------------+-------+----------+
| database_name  | table_name |    name     | type  | nullable |
+----------------+------------+-------------+-------+----------+
| public         | part       | p_partkey   | INT   | f        |
| public         | part       | p_name      | TEXT  | f        |
| public         | part       | p_mfgr      | TEXT  | f        |
| public         | part       | p_category  | TEXT  | f        |
| public         | part       | p_brand     | TEXT  | f        |
| public         | part       | p_color     | TEXT  | f        |
| public         | part       | p_type      | TEXT  | f        |
| public         | part       | p_size      | INT   | f        |
| public         | part       | p_container | TEXT  | f        |
+----------------+------------+-------------+-------+----------+

Tables in this example use the public schema, the default in Redpanda SQL. For information on displaying tables from other schemas, see Schema.

Describe a database

To list all tables in the database, run:

DESCRIBE DATABASE;

The query returns:

+-----------------------------+
| name                        |
+-----------------------------+
| supplier_scale_1_no_index   |
| features                    |
| orders                      |
| features2                   |
| featurestable               |
| featurestable1              |
| featurestable10             |
+-----------------------------+

Describe a catalog table

To view column details for a table mapped through a Redpanda catalog, run:

DESCRIBE TABLE default_redpanda_catalog=>transactions;

The query returns:

+---------------------------+--------------+-------------+-------+----------+
| database_name             | table_name   |    name     | type  | nullable |
+---------------------------+--------------+-------------+-------+----------+
| default_redpanda_catalog  | transactions | tx_id       | INT   | f        |
| default_redpanda_catalog  | transactions | amount      | REAL  | f        |
| default_redpanda_catalog  | transactions | created_at  | TEXT  | f        |
+---------------------------+--------------+-------------+-------+----------+

Describe a Redpanda catalog

To list the tables and topic mappings in a Redpanda catalog, run:

DESCRIBE REDPANDA CATALOG default_redpanda_catalog;

The query returns:

+----------------+--------------+
| table_name     | topic_name   |
+----------------+--------------+
| transactions   | transactions |
| user_events    | user-events  |
+----------------+--------------+

Describe an Iceberg catalog

To list connection details for an Iceberg catalog, run:

DESCRIBE ICEBERG CATALOG lakehouse_catalog;

The query returns the catalog’s REST endpoint, warehouse, and authentication type.