With SQL, you use the SELECT statement to retrieve one or more rows from a table. You use the WHERE clause to determine the data that is returned to you.

Amazon DynamoDB provides the following operations for reading data:

ExecuteStatement retrieves a single or multiple items from a table. BatchExecuteStatement retrieves multiple items from different tables in a single operation. Both of these operations use PartiQL, a SQL-compatible query language.

GetItem – Retrieves a single item from a table. This is the most efficient way to read a single item because it provides direct access to the physical location of the item. (DynamoDB also provides the BatchGetItem operation, allowing you to perform up to 100 GetItem calls in a single operation.)

Query – Retrieves all of the items that have a specific partition key. Within those items, you can apply a condition to the sort key and retrieve only a subset of the data. Query provides quick, efficient access to the partitions where the data is stored. (For more information, see Partitions and data distribution.)

Scan – Retrieves all of the items in the specified table. (This operation should not be used with large tables because it can consume large amounts of system resources.)