LIKE Condition : SQL SERVER

The LIKE condition allows you to use wildcards in the where clause of an SQL statement. This allows you to perform pattern matching. The LIKE condition can be used in any valid SQL statement - select, insert, update, or delete.
The patterns that you can choose from are:
% allows you to match any string of any length (including zero length)
_ allows you to match on a single character

Examples using % wildcard
The first example that we'll take a look at involves using % in the where clause of a select statement. We are going to try to find all of the suppliers whose name begins with 'Hew'.

SELECT * FROM suppliers
WHERE supplier_name like 'Hew%';

You can also using the wildcard multiple times within the same string. For example,

SELECT * FROM suppliers
WHERE supplier_name like '%bob%';

In this example, we are looking for all suppliers whose name contains the characters 'bob'.
You could also use the LIKE condition to find suppliers whose name does not start with 'T'. For example,

SELECT * FROM suppliers
WHERE supplier_name not like 'T%';

By placing the not keyword in front of the LIKE condition, you are able to retrieve all suppliers whose name does not start with 'T'.
Examples using _ wildcard
Next, let's explain how the _ wildcard works. Remember that the _ is looking for only one character.
For example,

SELECT * FROM suppliers
WHERE supplier_name like 'Sm_th';

This SQL statement would return all suppliers whose name is 5 characters long, where the first two characters is 'Sm' and the last two characters is 'th'. For example, it could return suppliers whose name is 'Smith', 'Smyth', 'Smath', 'Smeth', etc.