Description

Returns the 1-based Nth element of a GEOMETRYCOLLECTION, MULTIPOINT, MULTILINESTRING, MULTICURVE, or MULTIPOLYGON. For a unitary geometry, including a TIN or PolyhedralSurface, an index of 1 returns the input geometry and any other index returns NULL. Use ST_PatchN and ST_NumPatches to access and count the faces of a TIN or PolyhedralSurface.

	Index is 1-based as for OGC specs since version 0.8.0. Previous versions implemented this as 0-based instead.

	To extract all elements of a geometry, ST_Dump is more efficient and works for atomic geometries.

Enhanced: 2.0.0 support for Polyhedral surfaces, Triangles and TIN was introduced.

Changed: 2.0.0 Prior versions would return NULL for singular geometries. This was changed to return the geometry for ST_GeometryN(..,1) case.

Changed: 3.6.0 TIN and PolyhedralSurface are treated as unitary geometries and are not decomposed into patches; use ST_PatchN to access faces.

This method implements the OGC Simple Features Implementation Specification for SQL 1.1.

This method implements the SQL/MM specification. SQL-MM 3: 9.1.5

This function supports 3d and will not drop the z-index.

This method supports Circular Strings and Curves.

This function supports Polyhedral surfaces.

This function supports Triangles and Triangulated Irregular Network Surfaces (TIN).

Standard Examples

Extracting a subset of points from a 3D multipoint.

SELECT n, ST_GeometryN(geom, n) As geomewkt
FROM (
VALUES
    (1, 'MULTIPOINT((1 2 7), (3 4 7), (5 6 7), (8 9 10))'::geometry ),
    (2, 'MULTICURVE(CIRCULARSTRING(2.5 2.5,4.5 2.5, 3.5 3.5), (10 11, 12 11))'::geometry )
    ) As foo(id, geom)
    CROSS JOIN generate_series(1,100) n
WHERE n <= ST_NumGeometries(geom)
ORDER BY id, n;

 n |               geomewkt
---+-----------------------------------------
 1 | POINT(1 2 7)
 2 | POINT(3 4 7)
 3 | POINT(5 6 7)
 4 | POINT(8 9 10)
 1 | CIRCULARSTRING(2.5 2.5,4.5 2.5,3.5 3.5)
 2 | LINESTRING(10 11,12 11)

1 | 0101000080000000000000F03F00000000000000400000000000001C40
2 | 0101000080000000000000084000000000000010400000000000001C40
3 | 0101000080000000000000144000000000000018400000000000001C40
4 | 0101000080000000000000204000000000000022400000000000002440
1 | 01080000000300000000000000000004400000000000000440000000000000124000000000000004400000000000000C400000000000000C40
2 | 0102000000020000000000000000002440000000000000264000000000000028400000000000002640

Figure

Extracting all geometries (useful when you want to assign an id).

SELECT gid, n, ST_GeometryN(geom, n)
FROM sometable CROSS JOIN generate_series(1,100) n
WHERE n <= ST_NumGeometries(geom);

Polyhedral Surfaces, TIN and Triangle Examples

A PolyhedralSurface or TIN is treated as a single geometry, not as a collection of faces. ST_GeometryN does not decompose the surface into patches, so an index greater than 1 returns NULL. Use ST_PatchN and ST_NumPatches to access individual faces.

This example requests the third element of a PolyhedralSurface.

SELECT ST_GeometryN(p_geom, 3) As geom_ewkt
  FROM (SELECT 'POLYHEDRALSURFACE(
((0 0 0,0 0 1,0 1 1,0 1 0,0 0 0)),
((0 0 0,0 1 0,1 1 0,1 0 0,0 0 0)),
((0 0 0,1 0 0,1 0 1,0 0 1,0 0 0)),
((1 1 0,1 1 1,1 0 1,1 0 0,1 1 0)),
((0 1 0,0 1 1,1 1 1,1 1 0,0 1 0)),
((0 0 1,1 0 1,1 1 1,0 1 1,0 0 1))
)'::geometry  AS p_geom )  AS a;

NULL

Figure

This example requests the second element of a TIN.

SELECT ST_GeometryN(geom, 2) as wkt
  FROM
    (SELECT
       'TIN (((
                0 0 0,
                0 0 1,
                0 1 0,
                0 0 0
            )),((
                0 0 0,
                0 1 0,
                1 1 0,
                0 0 0
            ))
            )'::geometry  AS geom
    ) AS g;

NULL

Figure

See Also

ST_Dump, ST_NumGeometries, ST_PatchN, ST_NumPatches