我发现接受的解决方案在我的MySQL安装上不起作用，返回一个空集，但这个查询在我测试的所有情况下都适用:

SELECT x.val from data x, data y
GROUP BY x.val
HAVING SUM(SIGN(1-SIGN(y.val-x.val)))/COUNT(*) > .5
LIMIT 1

我下面提出的解决方案只需要一个查询，而不需要创建表、变量甚至子查询。 另外，它可以让你在组-查询(这是我需要的!)

SELECT `columnA`, 
SUBSTRING_INDEX(SUBSTRING_INDEX(GROUP_CONCAT(`columnB` ORDER BY `columnB`), ',', CEILING((COUNT(`columnB`)/2))), ',', -1) medianOfColumnB
FROM `tableC`
-- some where clause if you want
GROUP BY `columnA`;

它之所以能够工作，是因为巧妙地使用了group_concat和substring_index。

但是，为了允许大的group_concat，必须将group_concat_max_len设置为一个更高的值(默认为1024字符)。 你可以这样设置(对于当前的sql会话):

SET SESSION group_concat_max_len = 10000; 
-- up to 4294967295 in 32-bits platform.

有关group_concat_max_len的更多信息:https://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.1/en/server-system-variables.html#sysvar_group_concat_max_len

MySQL从8.0版本开始支持窗口函数，您可以使用ROW_NUMBER或DENSE_RANK(不要使用RANK，因为它将相同的RANK分配给相同的值，就像在体育排名):

SELECT AVG(t1.val) AS median_val
  FROM (SELECT val, 
               ROW_NUMBER() OVER(ORDER BY val) AS rownum
          FROM data) t1,
       (SELECT COUNT(*) AS num_records FROM data) t2
 WHERE t1.row_num IN
       (FLOOR((t2.num_records + 1) / 2), 
        FLOOR((t2.num_records + 2) / 2));

我刚刚在网上的评论中找到了另一个答案:

对于几乎所有SQL中的中位数: SELECT x.val from data x, data y GROUP BY x.val 总和(符号(1-SIGN (y.val-x.val))) = (COUNT (*) + 1) / 2

确保列有良好的索引，并且索引用于筛选和排序。与解释计划核对。

select count(*) from table --find the number of rows

计算“中值”行号。可能使用:median_row = floor(count / 2)。

然后把它从列表中挑出来:

select val from table order by val asc limit median_row,1

这将返回您想要的值的一行。

MySQL文档中这一页的注释有以下建议:

-- (mostly) High Performance scaling MEDIAN function per group
-- Median defined in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median
--
-- by Peter Hlavac
-- 06.11.2008
--
-- Example Table:

DROP table if exists table_median;
CREATE TABLE table_median (id INTEGER(11),val INTEGER(11));
COMMIT;


INSERT INTO table_median (id, val) VALUES
(1, 7), (1, 4), (1, 5), (1, 1), (1, 8), (1, 3), (1, 6),
(2, 4),
(3, 5), (3, 2),
(4, 5), (4, 12), (4, 1), (4, 7);



-- Calculating the MEDIAN
SELECT @a := 0;
SELECT
id,
AVG(val) AS MEDIAN
FROM (
SELECT
id,
val
FROM (
SELECT
-- Create an index n for every id
@a := (@a + 1) mod o.c AS shifted_n,
IF(@a mod o.c=0, o.c, @a) AS n,
o.id,
o.val,
-- the number of elements for every id
o.c
FROM (
SELECT
t_o.id,
val,
c
FROM
table_median t_o INNER JOIN
(SELECT
id,
COUNT(1) AS c
FROM
table_median
GROUP BY
id
) t2
ON (t2.id = t_o.id)
ORDER BY
t_o.id,val
) o
) a
WHERE
IF(
-- if there is an even number of elements
-- take the lower and the upper median
-- and use AVG(lower,upper)
c MOD 2 = 0,
n = c DIV 2 OR n = (c DIV 2)+1,

-- if its an odd number of elements
-- take the first if its only one element
-- or take the one in the middle
IF(
c = 1,
n = 1,
n = c DIV 2 + 1
)
)
) a
GROUP BY
id;

-- Explanation:
-- The Statement creates a helper table like
--
-- n id val count
-- ----------------
-- 1, 1, 1, 7
-- 2, 1, 3, 7
-- 3, 1, 4, 7
-- 4, 1, 5, 7
-- 5, 1, 6, 7
-- 6, 1, 7, 7
-- 7, 1, 8, 7
--
-- 1, 2, 4, 1

-- 1, 3, 2, 2
-- 2, 3, 5, 2
--
-- 1, 4, 1, 4
-- 2, 4, 5, 4
-- 3, 4, 7, 4
-- 4, 4, 12, 4


-- from there we can select the n-th element on the position: count div 2 + 1 

另一个对Velcrow答案的重复，但使用了一个中间表，并利用了用于行编号的变量来获得计数，而不是执行额外的查询来计算它。还开始计数，以便第一行是第0行，以便简单地使用Floor和Ceil选择中位数行。

SELECT Avg(tmp.val) as median_val
    FROM (SELECT inTab.val, @rows := @rows + 1 as rowNum
              FROM data as inTab,  (SELECT @rows := -1) as init
              -- Replace with better where clause or delete
              WHERE 2 > 1
              ORDER BY inTab.val) as tmp
    WHERE tmp.rowNum in (Floor(@rows / 2), Ceil(@rows / 2));