The MyISAM Storage Engine -- Simple table definitions can be switched from one to another. CREATE TABLE t2 (i INT) ENGINE = CSV; CREATE TABLE t3 (i INT) ENGINE = MEMORY; When you omit the  ENGINE  option, the default storage engine is used. The default engine is  InnoDB in MySQL 8.0. You can specify the default engine by using the  --default-storage-engine  server startup option, or by setting the  default-storage-engine  option in the  my.cnf  configuration file. You can set the default storage engine for the current session by setting the  default_storage_engine variable: The storage engine for  TEMPORARY  tables created with  CREATE TEMPORARY TABLE  can be set separately from the engine for permanent tables by setting the  default_tmp_storage_engine , either at startup or at runtime. SET default_storage_engine=NDBCLUSTER; ALTER TABLE t ENGINE = InnoDB; To convert a table from one storage engine to another, use an  ALTER TABLE  statement that indicates the new engine: See Section 13.1.20, “CREATE TABLE Statement” , and Section 13.1.9, “ALTER TABLE Statement” . If you try to use a storage engine that is not compiled in or that is compiled in but deactivated, MySQL instead creates a table using the default storage engine. For example, in a replication setup, perhaps your source server uses  InnoDB  tables for maximum safety, but the replica servers use other storage engines for speed at the expense of durability or concurrency. By default, a warning is generated whenever  CREATE TABLE  or  ALTER TABLE  cannot use the default storage engine. To prevent confusing, unintended behavior if the desired engine is unavailable, enable the  NO_ENGINE_SUBSTITUTION  SQL mode. If the desired engine is unavailable, this setting produces an error instead of a warning, and the table is not created or altered. See Section 5.1.11, “Server SQL Modes” . MySQL may store a table’s index and data in one or more other files, depending on the storage engine. Table and column definitions are stored in the MySQL data dictionary. Individual storage engines create any additional files required for the tables that they manage. If a table name contains special characters, the names for the table files contain encoded versions of those characters as described in Section 9.2.4, “Mapping of Identifiers to File Names” . MyISAM  is based on the older (and no longer available)  ISAM  storage engine but has many useful extensions. Table 16.2 MyISAM Storage Engine Features Feature Support B-tree indexes Yes Backup/point-in-time recovery  (Implemented in the server, rather than in the storage engine.) Yes Cluster database support No Clustered indexes No 3401 16.2 The MyISAM Storage Engine