OCR GCSE Computer Science Complete Practice Exam 2026

The command that allows you to specify the exact record when modifying records in SQL is "WHERE". This clause is essential in SQL statements like UPDATE or DELETE because it narrows down the selection to the specific row(s) that need to be modified.

For example, if you want to update the email address of a user in a database, using a WHERE clause allows you to specify which user to update by providing a unique identifier, such as a user ID. Without this clause, an update or delete command would affect all records in the table, which is usually not the intended action. The WHERE clause ensures precision in your SQL commands by filtering the records that will be affected, preventing unintended modifications to other records.

In contrast, the other commands do not provide this level of specificity for targeting records. INSERT INTO is used to add new records, SET is typically used in conjunction with commands like UPDATE to define the new data for the specified records but does not identify which records to update, and SELECT is utilized to retrieve data from the database rather than modify it.