Things which are just different between PostgreSQL and T-SQL / SSMS

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A detailed comparison of PostgreSQL and Microsoft's T-SQL for SSMS Part four of a four-part series of blogs
Even though Microsoft's SQL Server Management Studio and PostgreSQL use the same underying language (SQL), the user interface and dialects are quite different at times, as this blog explains. A detailed comparison of PostgreSQL and Microsoft's T-SQL for SSMS Things which SSMS and/or T-SQL does better Things which Postgres does better than SSMS / T-SQL Things which are just different between PostgreSQL and T-SQL / SSMS (this blog)

A detailed comparison of PostgreSQL and Microsoft's T-SQL for SSMS

Part four of a four-part series of blogs

Even though Microsoft's SQL Server Management Studio and PostgreSQL use the same underying language (SQL), the user interface and dialects are quite different at times, as this blog explains.

A detailed comparison of PostgreSQL and Microsoft's T-SQL for SSMS
Things which SSMS and/or T-SQL does better
Things which Postgres does better than SSMS / T-SQL
Things which are just different between PostgreSQL and T-SQL / SSMS (this blog)

Posted by Andy Brown on 06 March 2026

In this blog

Concatenation is different
LIMIT versus TOP
Formatting dates
Missing functions in Postgres
Different functions

You can decide for yourself for each of the differences listed below (in no particular order) which of the approaches you prefer!

Concatenation is different

Compare the T-SQL method:

Joining two colums together in T-SQL.

With the PosgreSQL method:

Joining two columns together in Postgres

The same thing using the || characters in PostgreSQL.

LIMIT versus TOP

if you want to get just the first N rows from a query, the syntax is different between the two dialects:

A T-SQL (left) versus PostgreSQL (right) query to list the 5 oldest directors.

Formatting dates

With the introduction of the FORMAT function into T-SQL, this now has a slightly easier way to format dates, but Postgres gets Brownie points for allowing you to show 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc.

The T-SQL way on the left, the PostgreSQL one on the right.

Missing functions in Postgres

Postgres doesn't have either of these functions:

Function	Use instead
IIF	CASE ... WHEN ... END
ISNULL	COALESCE

In neither case is this a particular problem, as the alternative methods are just as good!

Different functions

Many functions in PostgreSQL are different to their T-SQL equivalents. Here are a few examples:

Task	T-SQL	PostgreSQL
Find one string within another	CHARINDEX('Owl','Wise Owl')	POSITION('Owl' in 'Wise Owl')
Get the length of a string of text	LEN('Wise Owl')	LENGTH('Wise Owl')
Getting today's date	GETDATE()	CURRENT_DATE
Casting data types	CAST(42 AS varchar(10))	CAST(42 AS text), but also 42::text

As a general rule, I'd say that the PostgreSQL functions are a bit more intuitive to use, and there tend to be slightly more of them.

I've limited myself in this blog to changes to do with basic selection queries. The more you delve into programming (scripting views, writing functions and stored procedures, declaring variables, etc) the bigger the differences between PostgreSQL and T-SQL become.

Parts of this blog
A detailed comparison of PostgreSQL and Microsoft's T-SQL for SSMS Things which SSMS and/or T-SQL does better Things which Postgres does better than SSMS / T-SQL Things which are just different between PostgreSQL and T-SQL / SSMS (this blog)

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Concatenation is different

LIMIT versus TOP

Formatting dates

Missing functions in Postgres

Different functions

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