Data normalization is the process of organizing data into a consistent structure to reduce duplication, prevent conflicting values, and make information easier to maintain. In relational databases, this commonly involves separating related information into multiple tables and defining relationships between them, so each piece of data is stored in an appropriate place rather than repeatedly copied across records.
For example, a customer’s contact details can be stored once and linked to multiple orders instead of being duplicated in every order record. This helps prevent problems when information changes and keeps database operations more reliable. Data normalization is closely associated with relational databases, database design, primary keys, foreign keys, and data integrity.
