> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://dexiejs.typogram.co/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://dexiejs.typogram.co/table/table.where.md).

# Table.where()

Start filtering the object store by creating a WhereClause instance.

#### Syntax

```javascript
table.where(keyPathArray);
table.where({keyPath1: value1, keyPath2: value2, ...});
```

#### Parameters

       

| indexOrPrimaryKey: String                 | Name of an index or primary key registered in Version.stores(). The special string ":id" represents the primary key. |
| ----------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| keyPathArray                              | (Dexie 2.x only) String identifying keyPaths to filter on. Must match a compound index or primary key.               |
| {keyPath1: value1, keyPath2: value2, ...} | (Dexie 2.x only) Criteria to filter                                                                                  |

#### Description

If a string, or array of strings was provided (indexes or primary keys), this method returns a WhereClause based on given index(es) or primary key(s). The returned WhereClause can be used to build a query on how to extract objects from the database using any of the methods in WhereClause. An array of strings represents compound indexes.

If a plain object containing criteria was provided, this method returns a Collection filtered using given criteria. If providing a single criteria, the keyPath must match with an index. If providing multiple criteria, it is recommended to have a compound index containing all of the keyPath (in arbitrary order), but it is not required. If no compound index, at least one of the keyPaths must match a simple index. If `Dexie.debug=true` and not having compound index of all provided keyPaths, a console.warn() will give a hint on how to index this query properly.

#### Return Value

WhereClause if string was provided

Collection if object was provided.

#### Samples

**Find friends named david, ignoring case**

```javascript
const friends = await db.friends.where("name").equalsIgnoreCase("david").toArray();
for (const friend of friends) {
  console.log("Found: " + friend.name + ". Phone: " + friend.phoneNumber);
}
```

**Find friends named David with age between 23 and 43 (two criteria)**

```javascript
const davids = await db.friends.where(["name", "age"])
  .between(["David", 23], ["David", 43], true, true)
  .toArray();
for (const david of davids) {
  console.log(`Found a David with age ${david.age}`);
}
```

*NOTE: This example uses* [*compound index*](https://dexie.org/docs/Compound-Index) *'\[name+age]' to squeeze the most performance out of IndexedDB in finding records with multiple criteria. Not all types of criteria can be filtered this way, but combinations of a range in the last part and equals on the first parts works.*

**Find a friend named David with age 43**

```javascript
const david43 = await db.friends.where({name: "David", age: 43}).first();
```

The above statement is equivalent to:

```javascript
const david43 = await db.friends.get({name: "David", age: 43});
```

#### See Also

WhereClause

Collection

API-Reference#query-items

Table.get()