What is the difference between VARCHAR2 AND CHAR datatypes?

Answer 1

char

Used to store character string value of fixed value.

The maximum no. of characters the data type can hold is 255 characters.

It's more faster than varchar.

varchar

Used to store variable size alphanumeric data.

The maximum this data type can hold is up to

In MySQL 5.0.3+: 65535 characters shared for the row.

It's slower than CHAR.

Answer 2

In my opinion, fixed length of data is MORE prefered in RDBMS, excepts altering column data length. Var data type column does not fit indexed column and frequently updated column.