Azure Storage Tables Concepts

Azure Table Storage is a NoSQL key-attribute store that allows you to store large amounts of unstructured data. It's a cost-effective and scalable service for storing non-relational data.

Core Concepts

Entities

An entity is a set of properties, similar to a row in a database table. Each entity has a maximum of 100 properties (excluding system properties). Property names are strings, and values can be of any of the following .NET types:

Entities are schema-less, meaning that different entities within the same table do not need to have the same set of properties.

Properties

A property is a name-value pair within an entity. Every entity must have two system properties:

Additional custom properties can be added to an entity, up to 98 custom properties.

Tables

A table is a collection of entities. Tables are not schema-bound, meaning that entities within a single table can have different sets of properties. You can create as many tables as you need within your storage account.

Storage Account

All Azure Storage services, including Table Storage, are accessed through a storage account. You can create a storage account in the Azure portal, via PowerShell, or using the Azure CLI.

Key Features and Benefits

Scalability

Table Storage is designed to scale to handle petabytes of data. By organizing entities into partitions based on the PartitionKey, Azure can distribute data and requests across many storage nodes.

Performance

Queries that target a specific partition (e.g., using a PartitionKey filter) are highly efficient. Range queries within a partition are also optimized, especially when using a sequential or ordered RowKey.

Cost-Effectiveness

Table Storage is one of the most cost-effective Azure Storage options for storing large volumes of structured or semi-structured data that doesn't require complex relational querying.

Flexibility

The schema-less nature of Table Storage allows you to evolve your data structures easily without rigid schema migrations.

Common Use Cases

Important Note:

Azure Table Storage is part of Azure Storage. For more advanced NoSQL capabilities with rich querying and global distribution, consider Azure Cosmos DB.

Querying Data

You can query data using REST APIs, the Azure SDKs, or OData queries. Query performance is optimized when you filter by PartitionKey and RowKey.

Example Query (Conceptual)

GET /MyStorageAccount/Tables/MyTable(PartitionKey='PARTITION1',RowKey='ROW1')

This query retrieves a specific entity with the given partition and row keys.

Partition and Row Key Design

The design of your PartitionKey and RowKey is critical for achieving optimal performance and scalability. Consider how you will access your data when defining these keys.

Tip:

To improve query performance, consider using monotonically increasing or sequential values for your RowKey when entities within a partition are frequently accessed in order.

Limitations