LIMIT

🎬 Scenario: Finding the Top Netflix Series

Your manager at Netflix, Alex, wants a quick snapshot of the top 3 most-watched series. Instead of returning the entire dataset, they only need a short list.

Alex asks:

Can you get me the top 3 most-viewed Netflix series? We don’t need the full list, just the biggest hits.

Your task is to use LIMIT or OFFSET to retrieve only the highest-performing series from the netflix_series table.

1. Limiting Results with LIMIT

The LIMIT keyword restricts the number of rows returned by a query. It is supported in MySQL and PostgreSQL.

Syntax

1SELECT column1, column2 
2FROM table_name 
3ORDER BY column_name DESC 
4LIMIT n;

• LIMIT n returns only the first n rows of the result set.
• It is usually combined with ORDER BY to return the top or bottom results.

2. Retrieving the Top 3 Most-Watched Series

To return the top 3 Netflix series by viewership, we use LIMIT 3.

Example Query

1SELECT title, total_views_millions 
2FROM netflix_series 
3ORDER BY total_views_millions DESC 
4LIMIT 3;

Output Example

What’s Happening?

• The query sorts series by total views in descending order.
• Only the first 3 results are displayed.

3. Using LIMIT with OFFSET

The OFFSET clause allows pagination, meaning you can skip a set number of rows before returning results.

Example Query: Finding the 4th to 6th Most-Watched Series

1SELECT title, total_views_millions 
2FROM netflix_series 
3ORDER BY total_views_millions DESC 
4LIMIT 3 OFFSET 3;

Output Example

What’s Happening?

• OFFSET 3 skips the first 3 rows.
• LIMIT 3 returns the next 3 rows, effectively showing the 4th to 6th most-watched series.

✍️ SQL Exercises

Exercise 1: Top 5 Highest-Rated Netflix Series

Alex, your manager at Netflix, wants to know which shows have received the highest audience ratings. Write an SQL query to retrieve the top 5 highest-rated Netflix series, sorted by rating in descending order.

Expected Output Example:

Write an SQL query to return the requested data.

Exercise 2: Recent Netflix Users

Netflix wants to see the most recent signups to track new users. Write an SQL query to retrieve the 5 most recent users who signed up, sorted by signup_date in descending order.

Expected Output Example:

Write an SQL query to return the requested data.