# MONTH

The MONTH function returns the month part of a value.

The argument must be a date, timestamp, or a valid character string representation of a date or timestamp that is not a CLOB, LONG VARCHAR, or XML value. The result of the function is a large integer. If the argument can be null, the result can be null; if the argument is null, the result is the null value.

The other rules depend on the data type of the argument specified:

- If the argument is a date, timestamp, or valid string representation of a date or timestamp: The result is the month part of the value, which is an integer between 1 and 12.
- If the argument is a date duration or timestamp duration: The result is the month part of the value, which is an integer between -99 and 99. A nonzero result has the same sign as the argument.

#### Syntax

    MONTH ( expression )

Select all rows from the EMPLOYEE table for people who were born (BIRTHDATE) in DECEMBER.

    SELECT * FROM EMPLOYEE
    WHERE MONTH(BIRTHDATE) = 12

Parent topic: Built-in functions