Comments on: SQL SERVER – Fillfactor, Index and In-depth Look at Effect on Performance

By: pinaldave

pinaldave — Wed, 15 May 2013 23:47:31 +0000

Thanks Paul, you have valid point.

By: Paul

Paul — Wed, 15 May 2013 12:40:07 +0000

you are copying text directly from Microsoft’s website. While I know at one point in this article, you said according to Microsoft. If you are going to quote them, please put quotes around it. Otherwise it is a copyright infringement.

By: Bill Healy

Bill Healy — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 14:50:49 +0000

I have several indexes that seem to stay above 80% fragmentation. I can rebuild them and get them down around 30%, but within minutes they are back above 80%. I noticed that all of these indexes have a FillFactor of 0. Could this be the problem?

By: SQL SERVER – Weekly Series – Memory Lane – #008 « SQL Server Journey with SQL Authority

Sat, 22 Dec 2012 01:31:54 +0000

[...] Fillfactor, Index and In-depth Look at Effect on Performance Creating Indices in SQL Server are one of the most important tasks of any SQL DBA. Performance of your database is directly depends on your skills and proficiency in creating and maintaining the right number and quality indices. Fill-factor is always an integer valued from 1 to 100. The fill-factor option is designed for improving index performance and data storage. By setting the fill-factor value, you specify the percentage of space on each page to be filled with data, reserving free space on each page for future table growth. [...]

By: Kirby L. Wallace

Kirby L. Wallace — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 21:56:54 +0000

From SLQ BOL: “When fillfactor is 0, DBCC DBREINDEX uses the original fillfactor specified when the index was created.”

By: Kali Charan Tripathi

Kali Charan Tripathi — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 13:50:13 +0000

Hi Pinal,

This is very use full information about fill factor, can you please give me some tips for the selectivity of non clustered indexes on very big table in a data warehouse.

I have one table with approx 90 GB data size & 150 GB index size. Should I remove some nonclustered indexes from my table because all scripts are taking long time to run. Doing horizontal data partitioning on this table with partitioned indexing.

By: Amir Hussein

Amir Hussein — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 14:14:58 +0000

How can we specify Fill Factor when creating a table? I mean for Primary Key?

By: tinoymalayil

tinoymalayil — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 04:57:29 +0000

Let me know how sql index is performing during select and insert into.
For query optimization we are using SQL Index. When we insert value into the database with or without using sql index. Which one will be faster..using sql index to insert or without index to insert?

By: SQL SERVER – Correct Value for Fillfactor – Quiz – Puzzle – 24 of 31 « SQL Server Journey with SQL Authority

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 01:32:00 +0000

[...] SQL SERVER – What is Fill Factor and What is the Best Value for Fill Factor Fillfactor, Index and In-depth Look at Effect on Performance Rebuild Every Index of All Tables of Database – Rebuild Index with FillFactor Change Default Fill [...]

By: Kasib

Kasib — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 01:41:41 +0000

Hey, I am in the process of preparing for 70-450 exam and I came across this question on the net. I eliminated the two answers, B,C. Index is performing fine, so no need to rebuild or reorganize. Can you please help.

QUESTION::::
You are designing index maintenance strategies. One large table has a clustered index which never has a fragmentation percentage of more than 2 percent. There is an XML column in the table, and INSERTs are run frequently against this table. You want to minimize the impact of reindexing operations on performance.

A) Drop the clustered index on the large table.
B) Rebuild the clustered index of the large table monthly.
C) Exclude the clustered index from reorganizing and rebuilding.
D) Reduce the fillfactor on the clustered index.

By: SQL SERVER – Interview Questions and Answers – Frequently Asked Questions – Day 20 of 31 Journey to SQLAuthority

Wed, 20 Jul 2011 01:31:14 +0000

[...] Specifying a fill-factor value of 70 would imply that 30 percent of each page will be left empty, providing space for index expansion as data is added to the underlying table. The fill-factor setting applies only when the index is created or rebuilt. (Read more here) [...]

By: Kuldip.Bhatt

Kuldip.Bhatt — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 10:49:10 +0000

very nice explanation and all the comments are very good.

By: Pinal Dave

Pinal Dave — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 13:35:27 +0000

Hello Srinivas,

Yes, when free space specified by fillfactor, fills after few insertion, page split wll occure. The benifit of fillfactor is to allow insert/update until the free space not filled. The free space specified by fill factor is reserved everytime the index is rebuild or defragmented. So we just have to plan a proper schedule to degrag/rebuild the indexes to maintain the free space and to avoid the page split.

Kind Regards,
Pinal Dave

By: Srinivas

Srinivas — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 07:54:31 +0000

Hi Pinal,

Nice Post.

But, I have a question here. In order to avoid page splits we use fill factor. If we don’t specify fill factor on a table, inorder to accommodate a new record page split happens, and while page split happening, it moves half of the page to another page and this is costly.

Lets say if i have mentioned as fillfactor 80, means it will reserve 20% of every page for new records. what if this 20% of space also filled with new records, what will happen at that time?

If it results in a page split, what is the difference of having a page split at the insertion or very first record or after sometime?

Please answer my question…

By: Chrystal

Chrystal — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 21:12:21 +0000

Pinal,That is very clear explanation. before I never know why we care about fillfactor. I ‘ve always used your site for help. Thank you so much for your all very awesome articles.

By: Rama

Rama — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 09:58:28 +0000

Hi Pinal,

You have nicely summerised a complicated as well as important subject.

Rama

By: Pinal Dave

Pinal Dave — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 20:02:50 +0000

Hello Laerte,

Yes, a fillfactor to 100 for any table that can be updated would definately cause page split issue. FillFactor 100 is only suitable for read-only tables.
Thank you.

Regards,
Pinal Dave

By: Ramdas

Ramdas — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 15:47:47 +0000

Nice tip on the fill factor for inserting rows with columns as identity. It is a key parameter to keep in mind while designing databases.

By: kapil Bhargava

kapil Bhargava — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 11:41:34 +0000

It proved to be very informative

By: kapil

kapil — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 11:40:28 +0000

Thanks for this post. this is very informative

By: Suhas

Suhas — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 06:31:24 +0000

Nice One
Thanks for the explanation

Suhas

By: Ritesh Shah

Ritesh Shah — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 05:17:21 +0000

You read my mind Sir, I was thinking to dig almost this topic but time doesn’t permit me. thank you very much for this great post. :)

By: Laerte Junior

Laerte Junior — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 02:13:26 +0000

Hi Pinal, Great Post. I totally agree “if the index key column is an IDENTITY column, the key for new rows is always increasing and the index rows are logically added to the end of the index”
I just believe there is not a rule to say that the if index key column is an IDENTITY column, you can configure the fillfactor with 100%
Even if you have index key column is an IDENTITY and configuring fillfactor to 100% if you have variable-length columns (varchar, nvarchar, varbinay) and they suffer constant change or change more than insertion, you will probably have problems with page splits . In these cases perhaps, even though the identity column, leaving a smaller fillfactor may be more appropriate.