The second-highest salary: Why the simplest SQL query is often the smartest

Source: Dev.to

The problem and sample data

We’re given an employee table:

Expected result: 2000.5678

Problem statement: Find the second highest distinct salary from the employee table.

Key requirement: Return NULL if fewer than two distinct salaries exist (e.g., all employees earn the same).

This isn’t about the “second row” — it’s about the second highest distinct value.

Three common solutions compared

METHOD 1: MAX() + Subquery

SELECT MAX(salary)
FROM employee
WHERE salary