How do I search for names starting with A in MySQL?

Use LIKE for this, as shown below −

select *from yourTableName where yourColumnName LIKE 'A%';

Let us first create a table −

mysql> create table DemoTable    (    StudentName varchar(100)    ); Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.66 sec)

Now you can insert some records in the table using insert command −

mysql> insert into DemoTable values('John Smith'); Query OK, 1 row affected (0.21 sec) mysql> insert into DemoTable values('Adam Smith'); Query OK, 1 row affected (0.13 sec) mysql> insert into DemoTable values('Aaron Taylor'); Query OK, 1 row affected (0.43 sec) mysql> insert into DemoTable values('Chris Brown'); Query OK, 1 row affected (0.27 sec)

Display all records from the table using select statement −

mysql> select *from DemoTable;

Output

+--------------+ | StudentName | +--------------+ | John Smith | | Adam Smith | | Aaron Taylor | | Chris Brown | +--------------+ 4 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Following is the query to search for names starting with A in MySQL −

mysql> select *from DemoTable where StudentName LIKE 'A%';

Output

+--------------+ | StudentName | +--------------+ | Adam Smith | | Aaron Taylor | +--------------+ 2 rows in set (0.00 sec)