How to Implement Pagination with Cursors in Go (Keyset Pagination)

Implement keyset pagination in Go by querying for records with IDs greater than the last cursor value to ensure consistent and performant data fetching.

Keyset pagination uses the last item's ID from the previous page to fetch the next set of rows, avoiding the performance issues of OFFSET on large datasets. Implement it by querying for records strictly greater than the last known cursor value and encoding that cursor in your API response.

func GetNextPage(db *sql.DB, lastID int64, limit int) ([]Item, error) {
    var items []Item
    rows, err := db.QueryContext(context.Background(), "SELECT id, name FROM items WHERE id > ? ORDER BY id ASC LIMIT ?", lastID, limit)
    if err != nil { return nil, err }
    defer rows.Close()
    for rows.Next() {
        var item Item
        if err := rows.Scan(&item.ID, &item.Name); err != nil { return nil, err }
        items = append(items, item)
    }
    return items, nil
}

Keyset pagination is like reading a book by remembering the last page number you read instead of counting pages from the start. It is faster and more stable because it doesn't skip rows, making it ideal for large lists where users might jump back and forth. You use it when you need to load the next chunk of data based on the last item the user saw.