Tablespaces You can use the  DATA DIRECTORY  clause of the  CREATE TABLE  statement to implicitly create a file- per-table tablespace data file outside of the data directory. For more information, see Section 15.6.1.2, “Creating Tables Externally” . File-per-table tablespaces have the following advantages over shared tablespaces such as the system tablespace or general tablespaces. File-Per-Table Tablespace Advantages •Disk space is returned to the operating system after truncating or dropping a table created in a file- per-table tablespace. Truncating or dropping a table stored in a shared tablespace creates free space within the shared tablespace data file, which can only be used for  InnoDB  data. In other words, a shared tablespace data file does not shrink in size after a table is truncated or dropped. •A table-copying  ALTER TABLE  operation on a table that resides in a shared tablespace can increase the amount of disk space occupied by the tablespace. Such operations may require as much additional space as the data in the table plus indexes. This space is not released back to the operating system as it is for file-per-table tablespaces. • TRUNCATE TABLE  performance is better when executed on tables that reside in file-per-table tablespaces. •File-per-table tablespace data files can be created on separate storage devices for I/O optimization, space management, or backup purposes. See Section 15.6.1.2, “Creating Tables Externally” . •You can import a table that resides in file-per-table tablespace from another MySQL instance. See Section 15.6.1.3, “Importing InnoDB Tables” . •Tables created in file-per-table tablespaces support features associated with  DYNAMIC  and COMPRESSED  row formats, which are not supported by the system tablespace. See Section 15.10, “InnoDB Row Formats” . •Tables stored in individual tablespace data files can save time and improve chances for a successful recovery when data corruption occurs, when backups or binary logs are unavailable, or when the MySQL server instance cannot be restarted. •Tables created in file-per-table tablespaces cab be backed up or restored quickly using MySQL Enterprise Backup, without interrupting the use of other  InnoDB  tables. This is beneficial for tables on varying backup schedules or that require backup less frequently. See Making a Partial Backup for details. •File-per-table tablespaces permit monitoring table size on the file system by monitoring the size of the tablespace data file. •Common Linux file systems do not permit concurrent writes to a single file such as a shared tablespace data file when  innodb_flush_method  is set to  O_DIRECT . As a result, there are possible performance improvements when using file-per-table tablespaces in conjunction with this setting. •Tables in a shared tablespace are limited in size by the 64TB tablespace size limit. By comparison, each file-per-table tablespace has a 64TB size limit, which provides plenty of room for individual tables to grow in size. File-per-table tablespaces have the following disadvantages compared to shared tablespaces such as the system tablespace or general tablespaces. File-Per-Table Tablespace Disadvantages •With file-per-table tablespaces, each table may have unused space that can only be utilized by rows of the same table, which can lead to wasted space if not properly managed. 3053