MS Access String Concatenation with the & Operator

In MS Access, the ampersand operator (&) is used to combine (concatenate) two or more strings into a single string. This is a fundamental operation for working with and manipulating text data.

String Concatenation with &: Definition and Usage

The & operator provides a straightforward way to join strings together. It's commonly used to create combined text fields from multiple columns or to build custom text strings from different parts. For instance, you might use it to combine a first name and last name, to create a full address from street, city, and state, or to construct a more descriptive label from several smaller text elements.

Syntax

string1 & string2 & ... & stringN
      

You can concatenate any number of strings by using the ampersand (&) symbol between them.

Example

Combining Columns into a Single Address Field

This example combines the 'Address', 'PostalCode', and 'City' columns from the 'Customers' table into a single 'Address' column (assuming a 'Customers' table exists with those columns).

SELECT Address & ", " & PostalCode & ", " & City AS Address
FROM Customers;
      

Address
--------------------------------------------------
(The combined address for each customer will be displayed here.)