10.9.2 The utf8mb3 Character Set (3-Byte UTF-8 Unicode Encoding)

The utf8mb3 character set has these characteristics:

• Supports BMP characters only (no support for supplementary characters)

• Requires a maximum of three bytes per multibyte character.

Applications that use UTF-8 data but require supplementary character support should use utf8mb4 rather than utf8mb3 (see Section 10.9.1, “The utf8mb4 Character Set (4-Byte UTF-8 Unicode Encoding)”).

Exactly the same set of characters is available in utf8mb3 and ucs2. That is, they have the same repertoire.

Note

Historically, MySQL has used utf8 as an alias for utf8mb3; beginning with MySQL 8.0.28, utf8mb3 is used exclusively in the output of SHOW statements and in Information Schema tables when this character set is meant.

At some point in the future utf8 is expected to become a reference to utf8mb4. To avoid ambiguity about the meaning of utf8, consider specifying utf8mb4 explicitly for character set references instead of utf8.

You should also be aware that the utf8mb3 character set is deprecated and you should expect it to be removed in a future MySQL release. Please use utf8mb4 instead.

utf8mb3 can be used in CHARACTER SET clauses, and utf8mb3_collation_substring in COLLATE clauses, where collation_substring is bin, czech_ci, danish_ci, esperanto_ci, estonian_ci, and so forth. For example:

CREATE TABLE t (s1 CHAR(1)) CHARACTER SET utf8mb3;
SELECT * FROM t WHERE s1 COLLATE utf8mb3_general_ci = 'x';
DECLARE x VARCHAR(5) CHARACTER SET utf8mb3 COLLATE utf8mb3_danish_ci;
SELECT CAST('a' AS CHAR CHARACTER SET utf8mb4) COLLATE utf8mb4_czech_ci;

Prior to MySQL 8.0.29, instances of utf8mb3 in statements were converted to utf8. In MySQL 8.0.30 and later, the reverse is true, so that in statements such as SHOW CREATE TABLE or SELECT CHARACTER_SET_NAME FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS or SELECT COLLATION_NAME FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS, users see the character set or collation name prefixed with utf8mb3 or utf8mb3_.

utf8mb3 is also valid (but deprecated) in contexts other than CHARACTER SET clauses. For example:

mysqld --character-set-server=utf8mb3

SET NAMES 'utf8mb3'; /* and other SET statements that have similar effect */
SELECT _utf8mb3 'a';

For information about data type storage as it relates to multibyte character sets, see String Type Storage Requirements.