Ray's Galactic Tech
Nov 24, 2025 · Databases
Why Storing Phone Numbers as VARCHAR Beats BIGINT in Billion‑Row Databases
This article explains why phone numbers should be stored as VARCHAR(15~20) rather than INT/BIGINT, covering underlying principles, performance tests, internationalization, security, large‑scale optimization techniques, and a concrete best‑practice checklist for enterprise systems.
MySQL indexingVARCHAR vs BIGINTdata normalization
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