BETWEEN clause versus <= AND >=

Question

Is there a performance difference between using a BETWEEN clause or using <= AND >= comparisons?

i.e. these two queries:

SELECT *     FROM table    WHERE year BETWEEN '2005' AND '2010';   

...and

SELECT *     FROM table    WHERE year >= '2005' AND year <= '2010'; 

In this example, the year column is VARCHAR2(4) with an index on it.

Answer 1

There is no difference.

Note that BETWEEN is always inclusive and sensitive to the order of the arguments.

BETWEEN '2010' AND '2005' will never be TRUE.