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use-raw-mode-with-for-xml.md

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title Use RAW Mode with FOR XML
description Learn how using RAW mode with the FOR XML clause in a SQL query transforms the resulting XML data.
author MikeRayMSFT
ms.author mikeray
ms.reviewer randolphwest
ms.date 05/05/2022
ms.service sql
ms.subservice xml
ms.topic concept-article
ms.custom
ignite-2025
helpviewer_keywords
FOR XML RAW mode
XMLSCHEMA option
FOR XML clause, RAW mode
RAW FOR XML mode
ELEMENTS directive
RAW mode
XMLDATA option

Use RAW mode with FOR XML

[!INCLUDE SQL Server Azure SQL Database FabricSQLDB]

RAW mode transforms each row in the query result set into an XML element that has the generic identifier <row>, or the optionally provided element name. By default, each column value in the rowset that is not NULL is mapped to an attribute of the <row> element. If the ELEMENTS directive is added to the FOR XML clause, each column value is mapped to a subelement of the <row> element. Together with the ELEMENTS directive, you can optionally specify the XSINIL option to map NULL column values in the result set to an element that has the attribute, xsi:nil="true".

You can request a schema for the resulting XML. Specifying the XMLDATA option returns an in-line XDR schema. Specifying the XMLSCHEMA option returns an in-line XSD schema. The schema appears at the start of the data. In the result, the schema namespace reference is repeated for every top-level element.

The BINARY BASE64 option must be specified in the FOR XML clause to return the binary data in base64-encoded format. In RAW mode, retrieving binary data without specifying the BINARY BASE64 option will result in an error.

Next steps

This section contains the following examples:

See also