How do we cleanup plan cache in SQL Server?

At times, we may need to cleanup plan cache in SQL Server. I have come across situations where I need to flush the plans from the cache for our testing purposes

to troubleshoot performance issues related to procedure/test environment.However, there is caution for this to use at production boxes as it may hurt the performance badly.

There are three ways to clean up plan cache as per our requirement.

1. DBCC FREEPROCCACHE

This DBCC command will clear/clean the entire cached plans from the SQL Server for the instance

I personally used for my test environment to clean up the entire plan before do a load test and followed by a single user test execution(this to generate fresh plan without affecting the actual load test)

--Clean up the entire plans for the instance
DBCC FREEPROCCACHE with NO_INFOMSGS
GO
--Check the count of the plans
Select dbid,db_name(dbid),count(1) From sys.dm_exec_cached_plans dec
CROSS APPLY sys.dm_exec_sql_text(dec.plan_handle) AS des
where db_name(dbid) in ('Nov_ProdStats','Dec_ProdStats') --Sample Databases for the demonstration
Group by db_name(dbid), dbid

2. DBCC FLUSHPROCINDB

This DBCC command will flush the plans for a database

Database id is a mandatory parameter for FLUSHPROCINDB execution

This way we will make sure the clean up will not have any impact on other databases

--Clean up the plans for a database
DBCC FLUSHPROCINDB (8) -- 8 is the databaseid of Dec_ProdStats
GO
--Check the count of the plans
Select dbid,db_name(dbid),count(1) From sys.dm_exec_cached_plans dec
CROSS APPLY sys.dm_exec_sql_text(dec.plan_handle) AS des
where db_name(dbid) in ('Nov_ProdStats','Dec_ProdStats') --Sample Databases for the demonstration
Group by db_name(dbid), dbid

3. DBCC FREEPROCCACHE with plan handle as parameter

This is to clean up the cache only for the plan handle supplied

--Identify the plan handle
SELECT cp.plan_handle, st.[text],*
FROM sys.dm_exec_cached_plans AS cp
CROSS APPLY sys.dm_exec_sql_text(plan_handle) AS st
WHERE object_name(objectid)='test'--test is a sample procedure name
GO
--Clean up the plan for TEST procedure
DBCC FREEPROCCACHE(0x05000C001B67A4684061C3B9010000000000000000000000)
GO
--Check the count of the plans
Select dbid,db_name(dbid),count(1) From sys.dm_exec_cached_plans dec
CROSS APPLY sys.dm_exec_sql_text(dec.plan_handle) AS des
where db_name(dbid) in ('Nov_ProdStats','Dec_ProdStats') --Sample Databases for the demonstration
Group by db_name(dbid), dbid

Hope you enjoyed this one, see you soon with another one. Meanwhile you can share any feedback or your thoughts here.