EXPLAIN SQL - Language Statements EXPLAIN Shows statement execution details. 1998-09-01 EXPLAIN [ VERBOSE ] query 1998-09-01 VERBOSE Flag to show detailed query plan. query Any query. 1998-04-15 NOTICE: QUERY PLAN: Explicit query plan from the Postgres backend. EXPLAIN Flag sent after query plan is shown. 1998-04-15 This command outputs details about the supplied query. The default output is the computed query cost. VERBOSE displays the full query plan and cost. 1998-04-15 To show a query plan for a simple query: postgres=> explain select * from foo; NOTICE: QUERY PLAN: Seq Scan on foo (cost=0.00 size=0 width=4) EXPLAIN 1998-09-01 There is no EXPLAIN statement defined in SQL92.