DESCRIBE TYPE¶

DESCRIBE can be abbreviated to DESC.

See also:: CREATE TYPE , ALTER TYPE , SHOW TYPES , DROP TYPE , UNDROP TYPE

Syntax¶

{ DESC | DESCRIBE } TYPE <name>

Parameters¶

name

Specifies the identifier for the user-defined type to describe.

If the identifier contains spaces or special characters, the entire string must be enclosed in double quotes. Identifiers enclosed in double quotes are also case-sensitive.

For more information, see Identifier requirements.

Output¶

The command output provides user-defined type properties and metadata in the following columns:


Column	Description
`name`	Name of the user-defined type.
`type`	Snowflake type definition that is the base type for the user-defined type.
`created_on`	Date and time when the user-defined type was created.
`database_name`	Database in which the user-defined type is stored.
`schema_name`	Schema in which the user-defined type is stored.
`owner`	Name of the role that owns the user-defined type, which is the role that has the OWNERSHIP privilege on the user-defined type.
`comment`	The comment set for the type, if any; otherwise, it is `NULL`.

Access control requirements¶

A role used to execute this operation must have the following privileges at a minimum:


Privilege	Object	Notes
Any	User-defined type

Operating on an object in a schema requires at least one privilege on the parent database and at least one privilege on the parent schema.

For instructions on creating a custom role with a specified set of privileges, see Creating custom roles.

For general information about roles and privilege grants for performing SQL actions on securable objects, see Overview of Access Control.

Usage notes¶

To post-process the output of this command, you can use the pipe operator (->>) or the RESULT_SCAN function. Both constructs treat the output as a result set that you can query.

For example, you can use the pipe operator or RESULT_SCAN function to select specific columns from the SHOW command output or filter the rows.

When you refer to the output columns, use double-quoted identifiers for the column names. For example, to select the output column type, specify SELECT "type".

You must use double-quoted identifiers because the output column names for SHOW commands are in lowercase. The double quotes ensure that the column names in the SELECT list or WHERE clause match the column names in the SHOW command output that was scanned.

Examples¶

Use the DESCRIBE TYPE command to list details about the age user-defined type:

DESC TYPE age;

+------+-------------+-------------------------------+---------------+-------------+--------------+---------+
| name | type        | created_on                    | database_name | schema_name | owner        | comment |
|------+-------------+-------------------------------+---------------+-------------+--------------+---------|
| AGE  | NUMBER(3,0) | 2025-11-06 09:23:59.882 -0800 | MY_DB         | MY_SCHEMA   | MY_ROLE      | NULL    |
+------+-------------+-------------------------------+---------------+-------------+--------------+---------+