---
title: 'PostgreSQL Integer Data Types'
page_title: 'PostgreSQL Integer Data Types'
page_description: 'This tutorial introduces you to various PostgreSQL integer data types including SMALLINT, INTEGER, and BIGINT for designing tables.'
prev_url: 'https://www.postgresqltutorial.com/postgresql-tutorial/postgresql-integer/'
ogImage: '/postgresqltutorial/postgresql-integer-300x59.png'
updatedOn: '2024-02-02T07:01:29+00:00'
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  title: 'PostgreSQL REAL Data Type'
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---

**Summary**: this tutorial introduces you to various PostgreSQL integer types including `SMALLINT`, `INTEGER`, and `BIGINT`.

## Introduction to PostgreSQL integer types

![postgresql integer](/postgresqltutorial/postgresql-integer-300x59.png?alignright)
To store the whole numbers in PostgreSQL, you can use one of the following integer types:

- `SMALLINT`
- `INTEGER`
- `BIGINT`

The following table illustrates the specification of each integer type:

| Name       | Storage Size | Min                         | Max                         |
| ---------- | ------------ | --------------------------- | --------------------------- |
| `SMALLINT` | 2 bytes      | \-32,768                    | \+32,767                    |
| `INTEGER`  | 4 bytes      | \-2,147,483,648             | \+2,147,483,647             |
| `BIGINT`   | 8 bytes      | \-9,223,372,036,854,775,808 | \+9,223,372,036,854,775,807 |

If you attempt to store a value outside of the permitted ranges, PostgreSQL will issue an error.

Unlike [MySQL integer](https://www.mysqltutorial.org/mysql-basics/mysql-int/), PostgreSQL does not provide unsigned integer types.

### SMALLINT

The `SMALLINT` requires 2 bytes storage size which can store any integer numbers that are in the range of (\-32,767, 32,767\).

You can use the `SMALLINT` type for storing something like the ages of people, the number of pages of a book, and so on.

The following statement [creates a table](postgresql-create-table) named `books`:

```sql
CREATE TABLE books (
    book_id SERIAL PRIMARY KEY,
    title VARCHAR (255) NOT NULL,
    pages SMALLINT NOT NULL CHECK (pages > 0)
);
```

In this example, the `pages` column is a `SMALLINT` column. Because the number of pages must be positive, we added a [`CHECK`](postgresql-check-constraint) constraint to enforce this rule.

### INTEGER

The `INTEGER` is the most common choice between integer types because it offers the best balance between storage size, range, and performance.

The `INTEGER` type requires 4 bytes storage size that can store numbers in the range of (\-2,147,483,648, 2,147,483,647\).

You can use the `INTEGER` type for a column that stores quite big whole numbers like the population of a city or even country as the following example:

```sql
CREATE TABLE cities (
    city_id serial PRIMARY KEY,
    city_name VARCHAR (255) NOT NULL,
    population INT NOT NULL CHECK (population >= 0)
);
```

Notice that `INT` is the synonym of `INTEGER`.

### BIGINT

If you want to store the whole numbers that are out of the range of the `INTEGER` type, you can use the `BIGINT` type.

The `BIGINT` type requires 8 bytes storage size that can store any number in the range of (\-9,223,372,036,854,775,808,\+9,223,372,036,854,775,807\).

Using `BIGINT` type is not only consuming a lot of storage but also decreasing the performance of the database, therefore, you should have a good reason to use it.

## Summary

- Use `SMALLINT`, `INT`, and `BIGINT` data types to store integers in the database.