Fastest way to delete all the data in a large table

Question

Check out truncate table which is a lot faster.

I discovered the TRUNCATE TABLE in the msdn transact-SQL reference. For all interested here are the remarks:

TRUNCATE TABLE is functionally identical to DELETE statement with no WHERE clause: both remove all rows in the table. But TRUNCATE TABLE is faster and uses fewer system and transaction log resources than DELETE.

The DELETE statement removes rows one at a time and records an entry in the transaction log for each deleted row. TRUNCATE TABLE removes the data by deallocating the data pages used to store the table's data, and only the page deallocations are recorded in the transaction log.

TRUNCATE TABLE removes all rows from a table, but the table structure and its columns, constraints, indexes and so on remain. The counter used by an identity for new rows is reset to the seed for the column. If you want to retain the identity counter, use DELETE instead. If you want to remove table definition and its data, use the DROP TABLE statement.

You cannot use TRUNCATE TABLE on a table referenced by a FOREIGN KEY constraint; instead, use DELETE statement without a WHERE clause. Because TRUNCATE TABLE is not logged, it cannot activate a trigger.

TRUNCATE TABLE may not be used on tables participating in an indexed view.

There is a common myth that TRUNCATE somehow skips transaction log.

This is misunderstanding, and is clearly mentioned in MSDN.

This myth is invoked in several comments here. Let's eradicate it together ;)

For reference TRUNCATE TABLE also works on MySQL

I use the following method to zero out tables, with the added bonus that it leaves me with an archive copy of the table.

CREATE TABLE `new_table` LIKE `table`;
RENAME TABLE `table` TO `old_table`, `new_table` TO `table`;

forget truncate and delete. maintain your table definitions (in case you want to recreate it) and just use drop table.