Compared to other JDBC methods, database metadata methods that generate ResultSet objects are relatively slow. Applications should cache information returned from result sets that generate database metadata methods so that multiple executions are not needed.

Although almost no JDBC application can be written without database metadata methods, you can improve system performance by minimizing their use. To return all result column information mandated by the JDBC specification, a JDBC driver may have to perform complex queries or multiple queries to return the necessary result set for a single call to a database metadata method. These particular elements of the SQL language are performance-expensive.

Applications should cache information from database metadata methods. For example, call getTypeInfo() once in the application and cache the elements of the result set that your application depends on. It is unlikely that any application uses all elements of the result set generated by a database metadata method, so the cache of information should not be difficult to maintain.