ilike for date PostgreSQL - SQL

Introduction

In PostgreSQL, ilike is a case-insensitive pattern matching operator used in SQL queries. This operator allows you to compare two strings and returns TRUE if they match, regardless of their case. However, when it comes to comparing dates, you may encounter some challenges. This guide will show you how to use ilike for date comparison in PostgreSQL.

Using ilike for Date Comparison

When comparing dates in PostgreSQL, you will have to cast the date values to a string format. This is because ilike only works with character types. Here is an example of how to use ilike to compare date values:

SELECT * FROM table_name WHERE to_char(date_column, 'YYYY-MM-DD') ilike '2022-08-15';

In this example, we use the to_char() function to convert the date_column to a string format with the YYYY-MM-DD format. We then use ilike to compare this date string to the value '2022-08-15'.

It is important to note that performing string comparisons on date values may not be as accurate as using the date comparison operators in PostgreSQL. For example, if your date_column value is 2022-08-15T00:00:00.000Z and you compare it to the string value '2022-08-15', it will return FALSE. Therefore, it is recommended to use the appropriate date comparison operators whenever possible.

Conclusion

In this guide, we learned how to use ilike for date comparison in PostgreSQL. We demonstrated how to cast date values to a string format and use ilike to compare them. While this method can be useful in some cases, it is important to use the appropriate date comparison operators for greater accuracy.