MySQL Rand() 函式可以被呼叫，以產生一個在 0 和 1 之間的亂數：
mysql> SELECT RAND( ), RAND( ), RAND( ); +------------------+-----------------+------------------+ | RAND( ) | RAND( ) | RAND( ) | +------------------+-----------------+------------------+ | 0.45464584925645 | 0.1824410643265 | 0.54826780459682 | +------------------+-----------------+------------------+ 1 row in set (0.00 sec)
當使用整數作為引數呼叫時，RAND()使用該值作為亂數的種子發生器。每次種子使用給定值生成，RAND()將產生一個可重複的系列數位：
mysql> SELECT RAND(1), RAND( ), RAND( ); +------------------+------------------+------------------+ | RAND(1 ) | RAND( ) | RAND( ) | +------------------+------------------+------------------+ | 0.18109050223705 | 0.75023211143001 | 0.20788908117254 | +------------------+------------------+------------------+ 1 row in set (0.00 sec)
可以使用ORDER BY RAND()進行隨機行集或值，如下：
要理解ORDER BY RAND()函式，考慮一個employee_tbl表，有以下記錄：
mysql> SELECT * FROM employee_tbl; +------+------+------------+--------------------+ | id | name | work_date | daily_typing_pages | +------+------+------------+--------------------+ | 1 | John | 2007-01-24 | 250 | | 2 | Ram | 2007-05-27 | 220 | | 3 | Jack | 2007-05-06 | 170 | | 3 | Jack | 2007-04-06 | 100 | | 4 | Jill | 2007-04-06 | 220 | | 5 | Zara | 2007-06-06 | 300 | | 5 | Zara | 2007-02-06 | 350 | +------+------+------------+--------------------+ 7 rows in set (0.00 sec)
現在，使用下面的命令：
mysql> SELECT * FROM employee_tbl ORDER BY RAND(); +------+------+------------+--------------------+ | id | name | work_date | daily_typing_pages | +------+------+------------+--------------------+ | 5 | Zara | 2007-06-06 | 300 | | 3 | Jack | 2007-04-06 | 100 | | 3 | Jack | 2007-05-06 | 170 | | 2 | Ram | 2007-05-27 | 220 | | 4 | Jill | 2007-04-06 | 220 | | 5 | Zara | 2007-02-06 | 350 | | 1 | John | 2007-01-24 | 250 | +------+------+------------+--------------------+ 7 rows in set (0.01 sec) mysql> SELECT * FROM employee_tbl ORDER BY RAND(); +------+------+------------+--------------------+ | id | name | work_date | daily_typing_pages | +------+------+------------+--------------------+ | 5 | Zara | 2007-02-06 | 350 | | 2 | Ram | 2007-05-27 | 220 | | 3 | Jack | 2007-04-06 | 100 | | 1 | John | 2007-01-24 | 250 | | 4 | Jill | 2007-04-06 | 220 | | 3 | Jack | 2007-05-06 | 170 | | 5 | Zara | 2007-06-06 | 300 | +------+------+------------+--------------------+ 7 rows in set (0.00 sec)