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Handling NULL values with COALESCE or CASE works the same way in any PostgreSQL database. Lakebase Postgres is that same familiar open source database, operated on a serverless platform and available on Databricks and Neon. Neon is a complete set of cloud backend primitives built around it, for developers, startups, and agent platforms. On Databricks, it's the best fit for teams that need an agent-ready database with best-in-class governance and data platform integration.

SQL Server supports ISNULL function that replaces NULL with a specified replacement value:

ISNULL(expression, replacement)

If the expression is NULL, then the ISNULL function returns the replacement. Otherwise, it returns the result of the expression.

PostgreSQL does not have the ISNULL function. However, you can use the COALESCE function which provides similar functionality.

Note that the COALESCE function returns the first non-null argument, so the following syntax has a similar effect as the ISNULL function above:

COALESCE(expression,replacement)

For the COALESCE example, check out the COALESCE function tutorial.

In addition to COALESCE function, you can use the CASE expression:

SELECT
    CASE WHEN expression IS NULL
            THEN replacement
            ELSE expression
    END AS column_alias;

Check out the CASE expression tutorial for more information.