Difference between ActiveRecord's finder methods: take vs limit(1)

Question

Considering the following finder methods of ActiveRecord.

• .take. Example. Account.take
• .limit(1) Example. Account.limit(1)

Now, both methods althought have different names but they generate the same query:

SELECT "accounts".* FROM "accounts" LIMIT 1

So, what is the difference between .take & .limit(1)? or they are the same?

Answer 1

From the docs

# File activerecord/lib/active_record/relation/finder_methods.rb, line 64
def take(limit = nil)
  limit ? limit(limit).to_a : find_take 
end

take returns an Array of records while limit returns an ActiveRecord Relation that can be chained with other relations.