Hints for Optimization Approaches and Goals

ALL_ROWS

FIRST_ROWS

CHOOSE

RULE

The ALL_ROWS hint explicitly chooses the

cost-based approach to optimize a statement
block with a goal of best throughput (that is,
minimum total resource consumption).
The FIRST_ROWS hint explicitly chooses the
cost-based approach to optimize a statement
block with a goal of best response time
(minimum resource usage to return first row). In
newer Oracle version you should give a
parameter with this hint: FIRST_ROWS(n)
means that the optimizer will determine an
executionplan to give a fast response for
returning the first n rows.
The CHOOSE hint causes the optimizer to
choose between the rule-based approach and the
cost-based approach for a SQL statement based
on the presence of statistics for the tables
accessed by the statement
The RULE hint explicitly chooses rule-based
optimization for a statement block. This hint also
causes the optimizer to ignore any other hints
specified for the statement block. The RULE
hint does not work any more in Oracle 10g.

Hints for Access Paths

FULL

ROWID

CLUSTER

The FULL hint explicitly chooses a full table

scan for the specified table. The syntax of the
FULL hint is FULL(table) where table specifies
the alias of the table (or table name if alias does
not exist) on which the full table scan is to be
performed.
The ROWID hint explicitly chooses a table scan
by ROWID for the specified table. The syntax of
the ROWID hint is ROWID(table) where table
specifies the name or alias of the table on which
the table access by ROWID is to be performed.
(This hint depricated in Oracle 10g)
The CLUSTER hint explicitly chooses a cluster
scan to access the specified table. The syntax of
the CLUSTER hint is CLUSTER(table) where
table specifies the name or alias of the table to be

HASH

HASH_AJ

INDEX

NO_INDEX

INDEX_ASC

INDEX_COMBINE

INDEX_JOIN

INDEX_DESC

accessed by a cluster scan.

The HASH hint explicitly chooses a hash scan to
access the specified table. The syntax of the
HASH hint is HASH(table) where table specifies
the name or alias of the table to be accessed by a
hash scan.
The HASH_AJ hint transforms a NOT IN
subquery into a hash anti-join to access the
specified table. The syntax of the HASH_AJ hint
is HASH_AJ(table) where table specifies the
name or alias of the table to be
accessed.(depricated in Oracle 10g)
The INDEX hint explicitly chooses an index
scan for the specified table. The syntax of the
INDEX hint is INDEX(table index) where:table
specifies the name or alias of the table associated
with the index to be scanned and index specifies
an index on which an index scan is to be
performed. This hint may optionally specify one
or more indexes:
The NO_INDEX hint explicitly disallows a set
of indexes for the specified table. The syntax of
the NO_INDEX hint is NO_INDEX(table index)
The INDEX_ASC hint explicitly chooses an
index scan for the specified table. If the
statement uses an index range scan, Oracle scans
the index entries in ascending order of their
indexed values.
If no indexes are given as arguments for the
INDEX_COMBINE hint, the optimizer will use
on the table whatever boolean combination of
bitmap indexes has the best cost estimate. If
certain indexes are given as arguments, the
optimizer will try to use some boolean
combination of those particular bitmap indexes.
The syntax of INDEX_COMBINE is
INDEX_COMBINE(table index).
Explicitly instructs the optimizer to use an index
join as an access path. For the hint to have a
positive effect, a sufficiently small number of
indexes must exist that contain all the columns
required to resolve the query.
The INDEX_DESC hint explicitly chooses an
index scan for the specified table. If the

INDEX_FFS
NO_INDEX_FFS
INDEX_SS
INDEX_SS_ASC
INDEX_SS_DESC
NO_INDEX_SS

statement uses an index range scan, Oracle scans

the index entries in descending order of their
indexed values.
This hint causes a fast full index scan to be
performed rather than a full table.
Do not use fast full index scan (from Oracle 10g)
Exclude range scan from query plan (from
Oracle 10g)
Exclude range scan from query plan (from
Oracle 10g)
Exclude range scan from query plan (from
Oracle 10g)
The NO_INDEX_SS hint causes the optimizer to
exclude a skip scan of the specified indexes on
the specified table. (from Oracle 10g)

Hints for Query Transformations

NO_QUERY_TRANSFORMATION

USE_CONCAT

NO_EXPAND

REWRITE

NOREWRITE / NO_REWRITE

Prevents the optimizer performing query

transformations. (from Oracle 10g)
The USE_CONCAT hint forces combined OR
conditions in the WHERE clause of a query to be
transformed into a compound query using the
UNION ALL set operator. Normally, this
transformation occurs only if the cost of the
query using the concatenations is cheaper than
the cost without them.
The NO_EXPAND hint prevents the optimizer
from considering OR-expansion for queries
having OR conditions or IN-lists in the WHERE
clause. Usually, the optimizer considers using
OR expansion and uses this method if it decides
that the cost is lower than not using it.
The REWRITE hint forces the optimizer to
rewrite a query in terms of materialized views,
when possible, without cost consideration. Use
the REWRITE hint with or without a view list. If
you use REWRITE with a view list and the list
contains an eligible materialized view, then
Oracle uses that view regardless of its cost.
In Oracle 10g renamed to NO_REWRITE. The
NOREWRITE/NO_REWRITE hint disables
query rewrite for the query block, overriding the
setting of the parameter

MERGE

NO_MERGE

FACT

NO_FACT

STAR_TRANSFORMATION

NO_STAR_TRANSFORMATION
UNNEST
NO_UNNEST

QUERY_REWRITE_ENABLED.
The MERGE hint lets you merge views in a
query.
The NO_MERGE hint causes Oracle not to
merge mergeable views. This hint is most often
used to reduce the number of possible
permutations for a query and make optimization
faster.
The FACT hint indicated that the table should be
considered as a fact table. This is used in the
context of the star transformation.
The NO_FACT hint is used in the context of the
star transformation to indicate to the
transformation that the hinted table should not be
considered as a fact table.
The STAR_TRANSFORMATION hint makes
the optimizer use the best plan in which the
transformation has been used. Without the hint,
the optimizer could make a query optimization
decision to use the best plan generated without
the transformation, instead of the best plan for
the transformed query.
Do not use star transformation (from Oracle 10g)
The UNNEST hint specifies subquery unnesting.
Use of the NO_UNNEST hint turns off
unnesting for specific subquery blocks.

Hints for Join Orders

LEADING

ORDERED

Give this hint to indicate the leading table in a

join. This will indicate only 1 table. If you want
to specify the whole order of tables, you can use
the ORDERED hint. Syntax: LEADING(table)
The ORDERED hint causes Oracle to join tables
in the order in which they appear in the FROM
clause. If you omit the ORDERED hint from a
SQL statement performing a join , the optimizer
chooses the order in which to join the tables.
You may want to use the ORDERED hint to
specify a join order if you know something about
the number of rows selected from each table that
the optimizer does not. Such information would
allow you to choose an inner and outer table
better than the optimizer could.

Hints for Join Operations

USE_NL

NO_USE_NL
USE_NL_WITH_INDEX

USE_MERGE

NO_USE_MERGE

USE_HASH

NO_USE_HASH
Hints for Parallel Execution

PARALLEL

The USE_NL hint causes Oracle to join each

specified table to another row source with a
nested loops join using the specified table as the
inner table. The syntax of the USE_NL hint is
USE_NL(table table) where table is the name or
alias of a table to be used as the inner table of a
nested loops join.
Do not use nested loop (from Oracle 10g)
Specifies a nested loops join. (from Oracle 10g)
The USE_MERGE hint causes Oracle to join
each specified table with another row source
with a sort-merge join. The syntax of the
USE_MERGE hint is USE_MERGE(table table)
where table is a table to be joined to the row
source resulting from joining the previous tables
in the join order using a sort-merge join.
Do not use merge (from Oracle 10g)
The USE_HASH hint causes Oracle to join each
specified table with another row source with a
hash join. The syntax of the USE_HASH hint is
USE_HASH(table table) where table is a table to
be joined to the row source resulting from
joining the previous tables in the join order using
a hash join.
Do not use hash (from Oracle 10g)

The PARALLEL hint allows you to specify the

desired number of concurrent query servers that
can be used for the query. The syntax is
PARALLEL(table number number). The
PARALLEL hint must use the table alias if an
alias is specified in the query. The PARALLEL
hint can then take two values separated by
commas after the table name. The first value
specifies the degree of parallelism for the given
table, the second value specifies how the table is
to be split among the instances of a parallel
server. Specifying DEFAULT or no value
signifies the query coordinator should examine
the settings of the initialization parameters

(described in a later section) to determine the

default degree of parallelism.
The NOPARALLEL hint allows you to disable
parallel scanning of a table, even if the table was
NOPARALLEL / NO_PARALLEL
created with a PARALLEL clause. In Oracle 10g
this hint was renamed to NO_PARALLEL.
The PQ_DISTRIBUTE hint improves the
performance of parallel join operations. Do this
by specifying how rows of joined tables should
PQ_DISTRIBUTE
be distributed among producer and consumer
query servers. Using this hint overrides decisions
the optimizer would normally make.
The NO_PARALLEL_INDEX hint overrides a
NO_PARALLEL_INDEX
PARALLEL attribute setting on an index to
avoid a parallel index scan operation.
Additional Hints

APPEND

NOAPPEND

CACHE

NOCACHE

PUSH_PRED
NO_PUSH_PRED
PUSH_SUBQ

When the APPEND hint is used with the

INSERT statement, data is appended to the table.
Existing free space in the block is not used. If a
table or an index is specified with nologging, this
hint applied with an insert statement produces a
direct path insert which reduces generation of
redo.
Overrides the append mode.
The CACHE hint specifies that the blocks
retrieved for the table in the hint are placed at the
most recently used end of the LRU list in the
buffer cache when a full table scan is performed.
This option is useful for small lookup tables. In
the following example, the CACHE hint
overrides the table default caching specification.
The NOCACHE hint specifies that the blocks
retrieved for this table are placed at the least
recently used end of the LRU list in the buffer
cache when a full table scan is performed. This
is the normal behavior of blocks in the buffer
cache.
The PUSH_PRED hint forces pushing of a join
predicate into the view.
The NO_PUSH_PRED hint prevents pushing of
a join predicate into the view.
The PUSH_SUBQ hint causes nonmerged

NO_PUSH_SUBQ
QB_NAME

CURSOR_SHARING_EXACT

DRIVING_SITE

DYNAMIC_SAMPLING

SPREAD_MIN_ANALYSIS

subqueries to be evaluated at the earliest possible

place in the execution plan.
The NO_PUSH_SUBQ hint causes non-merged
subqueries to be evaluated as the last step in the
execution plan.
Specifies a name for a query block. (from Oracle
10g)
Oracle can replace literals in SQL statements
with bind variables, if it is safe to do so. This is
controlled with the CURSOR_SHARING startup
parameter. The CURSOR_SHARING_EXACT
hint causes this behavior to be switched off. In
other words, Oracle executes the SQL statement
without any attempt to replace literals by bind
variables.
The DRIVING_SITE hint forces query
execution to be done for the table at a different
site than that selected by Oracle
The DYNAMIC_SAMPLING hint lets you
control dynamic sampling to improve server
performance by determining more accurate
predicate selectivity and statistics for tables and
indexes. You can set the value of
DYNAMIC_SAMPLING to a value from 0 to
10. The higher the level, the more effort the
compiler puts into dynamic sampling and the
more broadly it is applied. Sampling defaults to
cursor level unless you specify a table.
This hint omits some of the compile time
optimizations of the rules, mainly detailed
dependency graph analysis, on spreadsheets.
Some optimizations such as creating filters to
selectively populate spreadsheet access
structures and limited rule pruning are still used.
(from Oracle 10g)

Hints with unknown status

MERGE_AJ

AND_EQUAL

The MERGE_AJ hint transforms a NOT IN

subquery into a merge anti-join to access the
specified table. The syntax of the MERGE_AJ
hint is MERGE_AJ(table) where table specifies
the name or alias of the table to be
accessed.(depricated in Oracle 10g)
The AND_EQUAL hint explicitly chooses an

STAR

BITMAP

HASH_SJ

NL_SJ
NL_AJ
ORDERED_PREDICATES
EXPAND_GSET_TO_UNION

execution plan that uses an access path that

merges the scans on several single-column
indexes. The syntax of the AND_EQUAL hint is
AND_EQUAL(table index index) where table
specifies the name or alias of the table associated
with the indexes to be merged. and index
specifies an index on which an index scan is to
be performed. You must specify at least two
indexes. You cannot specify more than five.
(depricated in Oracle 10g)
The STAR hint forces the large table to be joined
last using a nested loops join on the index. The
optimizer will consider different permutations of
the small tables. (depricated in Oracle 10g)
Usage: BITMAP(table_name index_name) Uses
a bitmap index to access the table. (depricated ?)
Use a Hash Anti-Join to evaluate a NOT IN subquery. Use this hint in the sub-query, not in the
main query. Use this when your high volume
NOT IN sub-query is using a FILTER or
NESTED LOOPS join. Try MERGE_AJ if
HASH_AJ refuses to work.(depricated in Oracle
10g)
Use a Nested Loop in a sub-query. (depricated in
Oracle 10g)
Use an anti-join in a sub-query. (depricated in
Oracle 10g)
(depricated in Oracle 10g)
(depricated in Oracle 10g)