Top MySQL Interview Questions for Freshers (2026)

Fresher interviews test fundamentals, not tricks. These are the questions that appear again and again in data analyst and developer interviews — prepare crisp answers with examples.

Key Points

• What is a primary key vs foreign key? (Definitions + one example each)
• Explain the JOIN types and when you'd use LEFT vs INNER
• DELETE vs TRUNCATE vs DROP — rollback and speed differences
• WHERE vs HAVING — before vs after grouping
• What are constraints? Name five with use cases
• Write a query: second-highest salary, duplicates in a table, department-wise counts

Pro tip: interviewers value a spoken example ('for instance, customers and orders…') far more than a memorised definition.