SQLite Viewer / Playground

How to use it

1. Open a .sqlite / .db file — or load the bundled sample database — and the schema tree fills with its tables, columns, indexes and row counts.
2. The first open downloads the ≈322 KB engine once; the file's 100-byte header is checked before that, so a wrong file refuses without any download.
3. Write SQL in the editor and press Run (⌘/Ctrl + Enter). Results render as a grid, 100 rows per page, with NULL and BLOB values badged.
4. Click Browse on any table for an immediate SELECT *, and re-run anything from the session's query history.
5. Changes run on an in-browser copy — your original file is untouched. Press Export to download the copy, edits included, as a .sqlite file.

Open a .sqlite or .db file and it becomes a live database in this tab: browse every table with computed row counts, then run real SQL against it — joins, PRAGMA introspection, EXPLAIN QUERY PLAN, even INSERT and UPDATE. The engine is SQLite itself, compiled to WebAssembly and running in a worker, so results and error messages match the sqlite3 in your terminal. The file is read on this device and never uploaded.

How it works

The engine is sql.js 1.14.2 — the SQLite C library, version 3.49.1, compiled to WebAssembly. It runs inside a Web Worker on this page: opening a file copies its bytes into the worker, where they become an in-memory database the real SQLite query planner executes against. That is why behavior matches your terminal — the same B-tree code, the same SQL dialect, the same error strings. Saving works the other way round: Export serializes the worker's database image back into a standard .sqlite file, so schema and data round-trip byte-faithfully through the download.

Before any engine bytes are fetched, the tool reads the file's first 100 bytes — the database header defined by the SQLite file-format specification. Offset 0 must carry the 16-byte magic "SQLite format 3\0"; offset 16 encodes the page size; offsets 18 and 19 mark a WAL-mode file; offset 56 names the text encoding; offset 60 is your PRAGMA user_version. A zip, a CSV or an encrypted container fails the magic check and is refused with a hexdump of its first 16 bytes — before the ≈322 KB download is ever worth paying for.

The schema tree is built the way SQLite documents it: a query over sqlite_master lists tables, views, indexes and triggers, then PRAGMA table_info names each table's columns with their declared types, NOT NULL flags and primary keys, PRAGMA foreign_key_list maps the references between tables, and PRAGMA index_list finds unique indexes. Row counts are genuine COUNT(*) results computed per table. Query results keep up to 10,000 rows, paged 100 at a time, and integers are fetched over sql.js's BigInt path so 64-bit values survive exactly.

Examples

SELECT ar.name, COUNT(*) AS albums, ROUND(SUM(al.price),2) AS total
FROM albums al JOIN artists ar ON ar.id = al.artist_id
GROUP BY ar.name ORDER BY albums DESC;

name|albums|total
Holly Golightly|2|17.24
Mina|1|12.5

SELECT name FROM sqlite_master WHERE type='table' ORDER BY name;

name
albums
artists

PRAGMA table_info(albums);

cid|name|type|notnull|dflt_value|pk
0|id|INTEGER|0||1
1|title|TEXT|1||0
2|artist_id|INTEGER|0||0
3|price|REAL|0||0

EXPLAIN QUERY PLAN SELECT title FROM albums WHERE artist_id = 1;

id|parent|notused|detail
3|0|61|SEARCH albums USING INDEX idx_albums_artist (artist_id=?)

INSERT INTO artists VALUES (3,'Nina Simone');
SELECT id, name FROM artists ORDER BY id;

id|name
1|Holly Golightly
2|Mina
3|Nina Simone

Every example on this page is executed against the same engine that powers the tool, on every build.

Common errors

no such table: missing

The classic first error in a foreign file: the table name is spelled differently than you expect. The schema tree and the sqlite_master query in the examples are the ground truth — SQLite names the missing table itself, and the banner repeats its words exactly.

near "SELEC": syntax error

SQLite's parser points at the first token it could not read. The message is rendered verbatim from the engine, so what you debug here is what sqlite3 would print in a terminal.

file is not a database

The engine's verdict when a file passes the 16-byte magic check but the pages behind it do not parse — most often an encrypted SQLCipher database or a truncated download. Encryption is not part of public SQLite, so such files cannot open here; decrypt them with your SQLCipher tooling first.

UNIQUE constraint failed: artists.id

Constraints are enforced for real, because the writes are real — inserting a duplicate primary key into the sample database fails exactly as it would anywhere else. The change that failed touched only the in-browser copy.

Keyboard shortcuts

⌘/Ctrl + Enter

Run the SQL now.

⌘/Ctrl + S

Export the database copy as a .sqlite file.

⌘/Ctrl + C

Copy the results page when nothing is selected.

⌘/Ctrl + Shift + C

Copy the results page even with a selection active.

t

Cycle the color theme.

? or ⌘/Ctrl + /

Show the shortcut overlay.

Esc

Cancel a run, or dismiss a banner.