How To Find The Highest Salary In SQL Server using MAX, DENSE_RANK, and SUB QUERY?

Method 1  SQL:-

SQL Server 2nd, 3rd, 4th... Highest salary using MAX,  DENSE_RANK, and SUB QUERY!

We can find the 2^nd, 3^rd, 4^th ... n^th highest salary using SQL Server the below query, In the below query use top 1 for the 2^nd highest salary, top 2 for the 3^rd highest salary, top 3 for the 4^th highest salary,.... n^th for the (n+1) highest salary.

Method 2 for MySQL:-

You can use LIMIT to get 2^nd, 3^rd, 4^th ... n^th highest salary!

Examples using MAX,  DENSE_RANK in SQL

====================================

DECLARE @Employees TABLE (

  employee_id INT,

  name VARCHAR(25),

  salary INT

)

INSERT INTO @Employees (employee_id, name, salary)

VALUES 

(1, 'Anil', 62000),

(2, 'Alok', 55000),

(3, 'Ajay', 70000),

(4, 'Rahul', 62000),

(5, 'Diya', 75000);

SELECT 

SALARY,

    DENSE_RANK() OVER (ORDER BY SALARY DESC) AS SALARY_RANK

FROM @Employees

/*Example 1  with Max*/

============================================

SELECT MAX(salary) AS SecondHighestSalary

FROM @Employees

WHERE salary < (SELECT MAX(salary) FROM @Employees);

/*Example 2 with  DENSE_RANK*/

================================================

;with cte as (

select salary, dense_rank() over( order by salary desc) as SalaryRank

from @Employees

)

select * from cte where SalaryRank=2 -- 2 = 2nd Highest Salary, 3 = 3rd Highest Salary, n = nth Highest Salary

/*********************************************************/

The expression in your query is:

DENSE_RANK() OVER (ORDER BY salary DESC) AS rank

 

Is this PARTITION BY or ORDER BY?

• This is only ORDER BY, not PARTITION BY.
• Your query uses ORDER BY only — to rank salaries from highest to lowest across the entire table.
• There is no partitioning of data happening here.

Explanation:

• The OVER clause in window functions can have two parts:
• PARTITION BY — divides the data into groups (partitions) and the function is applied within each partition separately.
• ORDER BY — defines the order of rows within each partition (or the entire dataset if no partition is specified).

In your case:

• Since there is no PARTITION BY, the entire employee table is treated as one single partition.
• The DENSE_RANK() ranks salaries across all employees ordered by salary DESC.

 

What if you had PARTITION BY?

DENSE_RANK() OVER (PARTITION BY department_id ORDER BY salary DESC) AS rank

This would rank salaries within each department separately.

/*********************************************************/

The examples using SUB QUERY,

--QUERY FOR THE 2ND HIGHEST SALARY
SELECT MAX(salary) AS [2ndHighestSalary]
      FROM Employee  WHERE salary not in (SELECT TOP 1 salary  FROM Employee
 GROUP BY salary ORDER BY salary DESC)

--QUERY FOR THE 3RD HIGHEST SALARY 
SELECT MAX(salary) AS [3rdHighestSalary]
      FROM Employee  WHERE salary  not in (SELECT TOP 2 salary  FROM Employee
GROUP BY salary ORDER BY salary DESC)

--QUERY FOR THE 4TH HIGHEST SALARY 
SELECT MAX(salary) AS [4thHighestSalary]
      FROM Employee  WHERE salary   not in (SELECT TOP 3 salary  FROM Employee
GROUP BY salary ORDER BY salary DESC)

--QUERY FOR THE 5TH HIGHEST SALARY 
SELECT MAX(salary) AS [5thHighestSalary]
      FROM Employee  WHERE salary   not in (SELECT TOP 4 salary  FROM Employee
GROUP BY salary ORDER BY salary DESC)

--QUERY FOR THE NTH HIGHEST SALARY 
SELECT MAX(salary) AS [nthHighestSalary]
      FROM Employee  WHERE salary   not in (SELECT TOP (n-1) salary  FROM Employee
GROUP BY salary ORDER BY salary DESC)

In MySQL simple and sweeter 2nd, 3rd, 4th... Highest salary.

You can use LIMIT to get highest salary!

Examples using MySQL LIMIT,

--QUERY FOR THE 2ND HIGHEST SALARY USINGH LIMIT
SELECT salary FROM Employee ORDER BY salary DESC LIMIT 1, 1;

--QUERY FOR THE 3rd HIGHEST SALARY USINGH LIMIT
SELECT salary FROM Employee ORDER BY salary DESC LIMIT 2, 1;

--QUERY FOR THE 4th HIGHEST SALARY USINGH LIMIT
SELECT salary FROM Employee ORDER BY salary DESC LIMIT 3, 1;

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