Editing Flat-file database (section)

{{Short description|Database held in an unstructured file}}
{{distinguish|Flat file system|Flat file (hand tool)}}
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[[Image:Flat File Model.svg|thumb|280px|Example of a flat file model<ref>{{cite web | title=Data Integration Glossary | publisher=U.S. Department of Transportation | date=August 2001 |page=10 | url=https://knowledge.fhwa.dot.gov/tam/aashto.nsf/All+Documents/4825476B2B5C687285256B1F00544258/$FILE/DIGloss.pdf | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090320001015/https://knowledge.fhwa.dot.gov/tam/aashto.nsf/All+Documents/4825476B2B5C687285256B1F00544258/$FILE/DIGloss.pdf | archive-date=March 20, 2009 | url-status=dead | access-date=April 16, 2025}}</ref>]]

A '''flat-file database''' is a [[database]] stored in a file called a '''flat file'''.  Records follow a uniform format, and there are no structures for indexing or recognizing relationships between records.  The file is simple.  A flat file can be a [[plain text]] file (e.g. [[Comma-separated values|csv]], [[Text file|txt]] or [[Tab-separated values|tsv]]), or a [[binary file]].  Relationships can be inferred from the data in the database, but the database format itself does not make those relationships explicit.

The term has generally implied a small database, but very large databases can also be flat.