SQL Server 2012 : Offset / Fetch

SQL Server 2012 launches Offset/Fetch which provide server side paging of results sets.

A Simplified example is this -

SELECT
  [columnlist]
FROM
  [table]
ORDER BY [column]
OFFSET [offset] ROWS
FETCH NEXT [rowcount] ROWS ONLY;

The new options are market in red above, and are -

• [offset] - Position to start retrieving rows from.
• [rowcount] - How many rows to retrieve

You've been able to achieve this in the past with a little ingenuity as the table below shows.

SQL Server	Method	Links
2012	OFFSET & FETCH	New T-SQL features in SQL Server 2012 – OFFSET and FETCH OFFSET – FETCH in SQL Server 2012
2005	ROW_NUMBER()	T-SQL: Paging with ROW_NUMBER()
2000	SET ROWCOUNT Trick	A More Efficient Method for Paging Through Large Result Sets