A Focus on TRY_PARSE()

Andy Brownsword takes a closer look at TRY_PARSE():

In the previous post we looked at the functions TRY_CAST, TRY_CONVERT, and TRY_PARSE and how they compared. I wrapped up and said that my preference for new developments would be to use TRY_PARSE due to the tighter control which it provides us.

As with everything in SQL Server however, there is no ‘best’ approach, it depends. I therefore wanted a separate post to look into the specifics with TRY_PARSE and areas where it may work more or less effectively.

Andy hits both the good and the bad of TRY_PARSE() and I recommend checking out this post. It’s great for parsing one row or a small number of rows (call it 5-10K or so), and really bad at parsing large numbers of rows.