Quickly Add and Drop a Column from all Tables in SQL Server

If you have been looking out for a quick way to add and drop a column from all the tables in SQL Server, then here’s the query for it. I will use an undocumented stored procedure sp_MSforeachtable for this purpose

USE Northwind
GO
-- Add a Column to all tables
EXEC sp_MSforeachtable 'ALTER TABLE ? ADD ColumnTemp varchar(10) NULL'

-- Remove a Column from all tables
EXEC sp_MSforeachtable 'ALTER TABLE ? DROP COLUMN ColumnTemp'

The query shown above adds the column ‘ColumnTemp’ to all tables in the Northwind database. Similar the ‘ColumnTemp’ is then removed from all the tables.

Note: While removing a column, I am assuming there are no constraints defined.

About The Author

Suprotim Agarwal, MCSD, MCAD, MCDBA, MCSE, is the founder of DotNetCurry, DNC Magazine for Developers, SQLServerCurry and DevCurry. He has also authored a couple of books 51 Recipes using jQuery with ASP.NET Controls and a new one recently at The Absolutely Awesome jQuery CookBook.

Suprotim has received the prestigous Microsoft MVP award for nine times in a row now. In a professional capacity, he is the CEO of A2Z Knowledge Visuals Pvt Ltd, a digital group that represents premium web sites and digital publications comprising of Professional web, windows, mobile and cloud developers, technical managers, and architects.

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