How to Create a View in SQL Server
Last updated July 25, 2026 · By the SaturnSQL team
Use CREATE OR ALTER VIEW ... AS SELECT (SQL Server 2016 SP1+), which creates the view or replaces its definition while keeping permissions. CREATE VIEW must be the first statement in its batch.
CREATE OR ALTER VIEW active_customers AS
SELECT id, email, last_seen_at
FROM customers
WHERE churned = 0;Views run their SELECT at query time. If that is too slow, an indexed view (created WITH SCHEMABINDING plus a unique clustered index) materializes the result, at the cost of restrictions on the SELECT and write overhead on the base tables.
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