Select Middle Rows in SQL Server

Question

I have a table where I want to select the last 10% of rows, offset by 10% (so I want to select the last 80-90% of the data).

I wrote the following query

SELECT TOP 10 PERCENT
   [col1], [col2]
FROM [table]
ORDER BY [col1] DESC
OFFSET 10 ROWS

But I receive the following error:

Line 5: Incorrect syntax near 'OFFSET'.

What am I doing wrong? I am using Microsoft SQL Server 2012 which should be compatible with OFFSET

Answer 1

Try something like this....

SELECT TOP (50) PERCENT *
FROM (
        SELECT TOP (20) PERCENT 
                      [col1]
                     ,[col2]
        FROM [table]
        ORDER BY [col1] DESC
     )T
ORDER BY [col1] ASC