Welcome to Snowflake Documentation

WELCOME TO SNOWFLAKE

DOCUMENTATION

In these topics, you will find the information you need to access your Snowflake account and perform all the administrative and user tasks associated with using Snowflake. The documentation also provides conceptual overviews, tutorials, and a detailed reference for all supported SQL commands, functions, and operators.

You can start by browsing the contents on the left or using the search box at the top to search across the documentation and other Snowflake resources. If you do not find the information you are looking for, please feel free to reach out to Snowflake Documentation or Snowflake Support using the buttons at the bottom of each page.

Getting Started

• Before You Begin

  System prerequisites and requirements for using Snowflake once your account has been provisioned.

• Logging into Snowflake

  Instructions for connecting to Snowflake using Partner Connect and supported clients.

• Snowsight Quick Tour

  Introduction to the main pages in the Snowsight and the tasks you can perform in each page.

Introduction to Snowflake

• Key Concepts & Architecture

  Overview of Snowflake architecture and basic concepts.

• Supported Cloud Platforms

  Overview of the cloud computing platforms on which Snowflake is offered.

• Supported Cloud Regions

  Description of the different cloud platform regions in which Snowflake is offered.

• Snowflake Editions

  Description of the services and features included with each edition of Snowflake.

• Snowflake Releases

  Description of the Snowflake release process and instructions for requesting 24-hour early access for Enterprise Edition (and higher) accounts.

• Overview of Key Features

  List of key/major features in the current release of Snowflake.

• Overview of the Data Lifecycle

  Introduction to the main tasks (and corresponding SQL commands) for getting your data into Snowflake and then using it to perform queries and other SQL operations.

• Continuous Data Protection

  Introduction to the powerful and unique features that Snowflake provides for ensuring your data is protected, secure, and available.

• Regulatory Compliance

  Description of the major regulatory compliance standards Snowflake meets to ensure the highest levels of data assurance, security, and governance for data in Snowflake.

Tutorials and Other Resources

This topic provides links to assorted “how to” tutorials/labs and “best practices” for using Snowflake.

Release Notes

These topics describe the new features, enhancements, and fixes introduced in recent and previous releases of Snowflake, as well as the features that are currently in preview. They also describe the required versions for the client software provided by Snowflake and the changes introduced in each client version.

Connecting to Snowflake

• Snowflake Ecosystem — Overview of the 3rd-party tools and technologies, as well as the Snowflake-provided clients, in the Snowflake ecosystem:

  • All Partners & Technologies (Alphabetical)

  • Data Integration

  • Business Intelligence (BI)

  • Machine Learning & Data Science

  • Security, Governance & Observability

  • SQL Development & Management

  • Native Programmatic Interfaces

• Snowflake Partner Connect — List of Snowflake partners who offer free trials for connecting to and using Snowflake; includes instructions for starting a trial through Snowsight and the classic web interface. More detailed instructions and trial terms are provided by the individual partners.

  
  

• Downloading Snowflake Clients, Connectors, Drivers, and Libraries — Instructions for downloading the installation packages for clients, connectors, drivers, and libraries.

  
  

• General Configuration (All Clients) — General configuration instructions that apply to all Snowflake-provided clients (CLI, connectors, and drivers):

  • Viewing Snowflake Client Versions

  • SnowCD (Connectivity Diagnostic Tool)

  • Allowing Hostnames

  • Limits on Query Text Size

  • OCSP Configuration

  • SQL Statements Supported for Preparation

• SnowSQL (CLI Client) — Detailed instructions for installing, configuring, and using the Snowflake command-line client:

  • Installing SnowSQL

  • Configuring SnowSQL

  • Connecting Through SnowSQL

  • Using SnowSQL

• Snowflake Extension for Visual Studio Code - Detailed instructions for installing, configuring and using the Snowflake SQL Extension for Visual Studio Code.

  
  

• Drivers - Detailed instructions for installing, configuring, and using the Snowflake-provided drivers Python, JDBC, ODBC, and other clients:

  • Go Snowflake Driver

  • JDBC Driver

  • .NET Driver

  • Node.js Driver

  • ODBC Driver

  • PHP PDO Driver for Snowflake

  • Snowflake Connector for Python

• Using Snowflake with Kafka and Spark - Detailed instructions for installing, configuring, and using the Snowflake-provided connectors for Spark and Kafka:

  • Snowflake Connector for Kafka

  • Snowflake Connector for Spark

Loading Data into Snowflake

• Key concepts related to data loading, as well as best practices.

  • Overview of Data Loading

  • Summary of Data Loading Features

  • Data Loading Considerations

• Overview of supported data file formats and data compression.

  • Preparing to Load Data

• Detailed instructions for loading data in bulk using the COPY command.

  • Bulk Loading Using COPY

• Detailed instructions for loading data continuously using Snowpipe.

  • Loading Continuously Using Snowpipe

• Basic instructions for loading limited amounts of data using the web interface.

  • Loading Using the Web Interface (Limited)

• Key concepts and tasks for executing queries on staged data and transforming data while loading it into tables.

  • Querying Data in Staged Files

  • Querying Metadata for Staged Files

  • Transforming Data During a Load

• Instructions for accessing data in other storage.

  • Working With Amazon S3-compatible Storage

Unloading Data from Snowflake

• Key concepts related to data unloading, as well as best practices.

  • Overview of Data Unloading

  • Summary of Data Unloading Features

  • Data Unloading Considerations

• Overview of supported data file formats for unloading data.

  • Preparing to Unload Data

• Detailed instructions for unloading data in bulk using the COPY command.

  • Unloading into a Snowflake Stage

  • Unloading into Amazon S3

  • Unloading into Google Cloud Storage

  • Unloading into Microsoft Azure

Using Snowflake

• Snowsight: The Snowflake Web Interface — Learn how to use Snowsight, the Snowflake web interface, for your Snowflake operations:

  • Snowsight Quick Tour

  • Getting Started With Snowsight

  • Using Worksheets

  • Visualizing Data With Dashboards

  • Snowsight: Managing Data

  • Snowflake Marketplace

  • Monitoring Activity

  • Administering Snowflake

  • Help and Support

• Classic Web Interface — Basic usage information for the classic web interface, as well as more detailed usage information for the Worksheets and History pages:

  • Using the Classic Web Interface: General Usage Notes

  • Changing Your Password / Switching Your (Session) Role / Logging Out

  • Managing Your User Preferences

  • Using Worksheets for Queries / DML / DDL

  • Using the History Page to Monitor Queries

• Virtual Warehouses — Key concepts and tasks for creating and using virtual warehouses to execute queries and perform DML operations, such as loading and unloading data:

  • Overview of Warehouses

  • Multi-cluster Warehouses

  • Warehouse Considerations

  • Working with Warehouses

  • Using the Query Acceleration Service

  • Monitoring Warehouse Load

• Databases, Tables & Views — Key concepts and tasks related to understanding and working with Snowflake databases and tables:

  • Understanding Snowflake Table Structures

  • Working with Temporary and Transient Tables

  • Working with External Tables

  • Overview of Views

  • Working with Secure Views

  • Working with Materialized Views

  • Table Design Considerations

  • Cloning Considerations

  • Data Storage Considerations

• Queries — Key concepts and tasks for executing queries in Snowflake:

  • Working with Joins

  • Understanding How Snowflake Can Eliminate Redundant Joins

  • Working with Subqueries

  • Querying Hierarchical Data

  • Working with CTEs (Common Table Expressions)

  • Querying Semi-structured Data

  • Using Window Functions

  • Identifying Sequences of Rows That Match a Pattern

  • Using Sequences

  • Using Persisted Query Results

  • Computing the Number of Distinct Values

  • Estimating Similarity of Two or More Sets

  • Estimating Frequent Values

  • Estimating Percentile Values

  • Analyzing Queries Using Query Profile

  • Canceling Statements

• Date & Time Data — Reference information and examples for working with dates, times and timestamps, and time zones in Snowflake:

  • Date and Time Input / Output

  • Using Dates and Timestamps

• Semi-structured Data — Key concepts and tasks for working with JSON and other types of semi-structured data:

  • Introduction to Semi-structured Data

  • Supported Formats for Semi-structured Data

  • Considerations for Semi-structured Data Stored in VARIANT

  • Tutorial: JSON Basics

• Unstructured Data — Key concepts and tasks for working with unstructured data:

  • Introduction to Unstructured Data Support

  • Directory Tables

  • REST API for Unstructured Data Support

  • Sharing Unstructured Data

  • Troubleshooting Processing of Unstructured Data

• Binary Data — Reference information and examples for working with binary data in Snowflake:

  • Binary Input and Output

  • Using Binary Data

• Snowflake Time Travel & Fail-safe — Key concepts and tasks for understanding how Snowflake maintains access to deleted and modified data, and also how Snowflake enables data recovery in the event of loss:

  • Understanding & Using Time Travel

  • Understanding & Viewing Fail-safe

  • Storage Costs for Time Travel and Fail-safe

• Continuous Data Pipelines — Key concepts and tasks for transforming and optimizing loaded data for analysis:

  • Change Tracking Using Table Streams

  • Executing SQL Statements on a Schedule Using Tasks

• Replication and Failover/Failback — Key concepts and tasks for replicating and failing over databases across multiple Snowflake accounts, as well as redirecting client connections, for business continuity and disaster recovery:

  • Introduction to Business Continuity & Disaster Recovery

  • Account Replication and Failover

  • Database Replication and Failover/Failback

  • Redirecting Client Connections

• Sample Data Sets — Key concepts and tasks for using the sample data sets provided with Snowflake:

  • Using the Sample Database

  • Sample Data: TPC-H

  • Sample Data: OpenWeatherMap — Deprecated

• Setting Up Alerts and Notifications — Key concepts and tasks for sending email notifications in SQL (e.g. from a stored procedure, task, etc.) and setting up alerts to perform actions or send notifications when data in Snowflake meets certain conditions.

  • Setting Up Alerts Based on Data in Snowflake

  • Sending Email Notifications

Sharing Data Securely in Snowflake

• Overview of Data Sharing at Snowflake

• Introduction to Secure Data Sharing

• Granting Privileges to Other Roles

• Data Sharing Usage

• Working with Shared Data

  • Share and Manage Shared Data using Snowsight

• Secure Direct Data Share

  • Data Providers

    • Working with Shares

    • Sharing Data from Multiple Databases

    • Sharing Data Securely Across Regions and Cloud Platforms

    • Using Secure Objects to Control Data Access

    • Managing Reader Accounts

    • Configuring a Reader Account

    • Enabling Sharing from a Business Critical Account to a non-Business Critical Account

  • Data Consumers

• Snowflake Marketplace and Listings

• Data Exchange

  • Data Exchange Key Benefits

  • Admin and Membership

  • Accessing a Data Exchange

  • Configuring and Using a Data Exchange

Managing Your Snowflake Organization

• Introduction to Organizations

• Getting Started with Organizations

  Instructions for working with organizations and assigning the ORGADMIN role to organization administrators.

• Managing Accounts in Your Organization

  Instructions for viewing and creating accounts in your organization.

• Connecting to Your Accounts

  Instructions for accessing your accounts.

Managing Your Snowflake Account

• Account Identifiers

  Detailed descriptions of the two unique account identifiers supported for connecting to Snowflake and using features that span multiple accounts.

• Trial Accounts

  Instructions for signing up for a trial account, adding a credit card to the account, and canceling the account.

• Parameter Management

  Instructions for setting account, session, and object parameters for your account.

• User Management

  Instructions for creating and managing users in your account.

• Behavior Change Management

  Instructions for enabling and disabling behavior change releases in your account.

Managing Security in Snowflake

• Summary of Security Features

  List of security features, grouped by subcategory (e.g. Object security).

• Authentication

  List of security features that enable secure authentication to Snowflake.

• Networking & Private Connectivity

  List of security features that enable secure networking and private connectivity to Snowflake.

• Administration & Authorization

  List of security features that enable provisioning users and groups to Snowflake, object access control, and data security.

Managing Cost in Snowflake

• Financial Governance Overview

  An introduction to the concepts and features that allow you to effectively manage cost.

• Understanding Cost in Snowflake

  Understand how costs are incurred as you use compute, storage, and data transfer resources in Snowflake.

• Exploring Cost in Snowflake

  Gain insights into historical cost using a dashboard in the web interface or by writing queries against data in the Organization Usage and Account Usage schemas.

• Monitoring Cost in Snowflake

  Learn about monitoring the cost of compute resources in Snowflake.

• Attributing Cost in Snowflake

  Learn how to attribute compute costs to an organization’s cost centers.

• Controlling Cost in Snowflake

  Implement cost controls to ensure that the actual cost of using Snowflake does not exceed expected costs.

General Reference

• Parameters — parameters that can be used to control system behavior at the account, user, session, and object level.

• Data Types — supported data types (VARCHAR, NUMBER, DATE, etc.) in Snowflake:

  • Summary of Data Types

  • Numeric Data Types

  • String & Binary Data Types

  • Logical Data Types

  • Date & Time Data Types

  • Semi-structured Data Types

  • Geospatial Data Types

  • Unsupported Data Types

• Ternary Logic — information about the behavior of NULL in boolean expressions and with comparison operators.

• Collation Support — information about sorting and other character-set-dependent operations on text strings.

• SQL Format Models — formats for specifying conversion of numeric and date/time values to and from text strings.

• Object Identifiers — rules for defining and using object identifiers, including resolving object names used in SQL statements:

  • Identifier Requirements

  • Literals and Variables as Identifiers

  • Object Name Resolution

• Constraints — concepts and reference information for defining and maintaining unique, primary key, and foreign key constraints in tables:

  • Overview of Constraints

  • Constraint Properties

  • Creating Constraints

  • Modifying Constraints

  • Dropping Constraints

  • Additional Constraint Details

• SQL Variables — concepts and reference for defining and using variables in sessions.

• Transactions — concepts and reference for using transactions with SQL statements.

• Table Literals — concepts and reference for using table literals instead of a single scalar value in queries.

• Snowflake Database — reference for the SNOWFLAKE shared database, which is provided by Snowflake for querying/reporting on your organization, account, data sharing, and other object usage.

• Snowflake Information Schema — concepts and reference for the Snowflake Information Schema, which consists of a set of metadata views and historical table functions for querying/reporting on objects in Snowflake.

• Metadata Fields in Snowflake — concepts and reference for metadata fields in Snowflake.

SQL Command Reference

• Query Syntax — structure of SQL queries in Snowflake.

• Query Operators — arithmetic, logical, and other types of operators.

• DDL (Data Definition Language) Commands — overview of DDL commands.

• DML (Data Manipulation Language) Commands — commands for performing DML operations, including:

  • Inserting, deleting, updating, and merging data in Snowflake tables.

  • Bulk copying data into and out of Snowflake tables.

  • Staging files for bulk copying.

• All Commands (Alphabetical) — alphabetical list of all the commands.

• Commands categorized by the type of objects and operations they control, includng:

  • General account-level objects (accounts, users, roles, securty policies, integrations, etc.) and operations (failover & recovery, etc.).

  • Session-based operations (session context, queries, variables, transactions, etc.).

  • Virtual warehouses (for loading data and performing queries) and resource monitors (for controlling credit usage).

  • Databases, schemas, tables, and other schema-level objects (views, sequences, etc.).

  • Snoflake extensions and application development (user-defined functions, stored procedures, scripting, etc.).

  • Objects for sharing data (shares, listings, etc.).

  • Objects for classifying, protecting, and governing data (masking polcies, row-access polcies, tags, etc.).

SQL Function Reference

• Summary of Functions — combined summary of all system-defined functions. Can be used as a quick-reference.

• All Functions (Alphabetical) — alphabetical list of all system-defined functions (scalar, aggregate, table, etc.).

• Scalar Functions — functions that take a single row/value as input and return a single value:

  • Bitwise Expression Functions

  • Conditional Expression Functions

  • Context Functions

  • Conversion Functions

  • Data Generation Functions

  • Date & Time Functions

  • Encryption Functions

  • Geospatial Functions

  • Numeric Functions

  • Semi-structured Data Functions

  • String Functions (Regular Expressions) — regular expression (search) functions

  • String & Binary Functions

  • Hash Functions

  • Metadata Functions

• Aggregate Functions — functions that take multiple rows/values as input and return a single value.

• Window Functions — subset of aggregate functions that can operate on a subset of rows.

• Table Functions — functions that return results in tabular format.

• System Functions — functions that perform control operations or return system-level information.

Snowflake Scripting Reference

• BEGIN … END

• BREAK

• CASE

• CLOSE

• CONTINUE

• DECLARE

• EXCEPTION

• FETCH

• FOR

• IF

• LET

• LOOP

• NULL

• OPEN

• RAISE

• REPEAT

• RETURN

• WHILE

API Reference

APIs for connecting to Snowflake

Connector / Driver / Client API	Resources
Go Driver	Developer Guide API Reference
JDBC Driver	Developer Guide JDBC API Support Reference
.NET Driver	Developer Guide Source code in GitHub
Node.js Driver	Developer Guide Source code in GitHub
ODBC Driver	Developer Guide ODBC Driver API Support Reference
PHP PDO Driver	Developer Guide Source code in GitHub
Snowflake Connector for Kafka	Developer Guide Source code in GitHub
Snowflake Connector for Python	Developer Guide API Reference Getting Started With Python
Snowflake Connector for Spark	Developer Guide Source code in GitHub
Snowflake SQL API	Developer Guide API Reference SQL API Playground

APIs for extending Snowflake:

Extensibility Feature	Resources
User-Defined Functions (UDFs)	Developer Guide Getting Started With User-Defined Functions
Snowpark for Scala	Developer Guide API Reference Getting Started With Snowpark in Scala
Snowpark for Java	Developer Guide API Reference
Snowpark for Python	Developer Guide API Reference
External Functions	Developer Guide
Stored Procedures	Developer Guide API Reference

Appendices

• Notational Conventions

  Notational conventions used in the Snowflake documentation.

• Reserved & Limited Keywords

  List of words reserved for Snowflake SQL.