Word.ws English Dictionary

covering index

covering index noun: a database table index that contains all the columns needed to fulfill the query.

Noun

covering index (plural covering indexes)

  1. A database table index that contains all the columns needed to fulfill the query.
    • Ordinarily, using a covering index will save one disk read (GAIN: 6/8). The gain is automatic but only if the columns in the select list exactly match the columns in the covering index.2003, Peter Gulutzan, Trudy Pelzer, SQL Performance Tuning, Addison-Wesley Professional, →ISBN, page 232

Forms of covering index

pluralcovering indexes

Questions about covering index

What does covering index mean?
Covering index means a database table index that contains all the columns needed to fulfill the query.
What part of speech is covering index?
Covering index is a noun.
What is the plural of covering index?
The plural of covering index is covering indexes.

Words near covering index in the dictionary

  1. covering
  2. covering fire
  3. covering ground
  4. covering horse
  5. covering horses
  6. covering index
  7. covering indexes
  8. covering letter
  9. covering letters
  10. covering number
  11. covering numbers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: covering index (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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