What command is used to export or unload data from Snowflake?

The command used to export or unload data from Snowflake to a stage (such as a file in an S3 bucket, Azure Blob Storage, or Google Cloud Storage) is thePUTcommand. ThePUTcommand is designed to upload data files from a local file system (in the case of SnowSQL or other client) or a virtual warehouse to a specified stage. This functionality is critical for scenarios where data needs to be extracted from Snowflake for use in external systems, backups, or further processing.

The syntax for thePUTcommand follows the structure:PUT file://<local_file_path> @<stage_name>, where<local_file_path>specifies the path to the file(s) on the localfile system that you wish to upload, and<stage_name>specifies the destination stage in Snowflake.

It's important to distinguish that thePUTcommand is used for exporting data out of Snowflake, whereas theCOPY INTO <table>command is used for importing data into Snowflake from a stage. TheGETcommand, on the other hand, is used to download files from a stage to the local file system, essentially the inverse operation of thePUTcommand.