Random Snippets

I was looking for a way to order the rows randomly in a MySQL query and the solution was not easy for me to come by. I am posting the solution here in hopes of helping others.

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SELECT * 
FROM my_table
ORDER BY RAND()

RAND() returns a random floating-point value but functions to randomly order the selection of rows in the above usage.

If you combine the query with LIMIT, you will end up with a random selection of rows from your table.

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SELECT * 
FROM my_table
ORDER BY RAND()
LIMIT 3

Assuming you have more than 3 rows in your table, you will always get 3 random rows from the query.