What is a relational database?

A relational database is a structured collection of information that is related to a particular subject or purpose, such as an inventory database or a human resources database. You use databases to manage information. Information, such as product name, cost, and on-hand inventory, is stored in a database. Within the database, you organize the data into storage containers called tables. Tables are made up of columns and rows. Columns represent individual fields in a table. Rows represent records of data in a table. You can think of database tables as grids, as in the following example:


This image defines the structure of a database table, and shows the location of fields and records.

Each field in the table contains one piece of information. In an employee table, for example, one column contains the employee name, another contains the employee phone number, and the other columns each store one piece of information, such as the address, city, state, zip, and salary information. Each record represents one set of related information. For example, an employee table might store information about one employee per row. The number of rows in a table represents the total number of table records.