Athena

Query data in S3 with Amazon Athena. Picking a table shows its columns without a run, because the catalog already knows them.

Category: Input
Connection: Amazon Athena

What it does

Runs a query in Amazon Athena through a saved Connection and streams the result into the pipeline in batches. Pick a table with the live database and table browser, or write your own SQL. Because the data catalog already knows a table's columns, picking a table shows them in the builder WITHOUT a run. Credentials live on the Connection.

Inputs and outputs

Inputs	None. This node starts a pipeline.
Outputs	One.

When to use it

Read data that lives in S3 without standing up a cluster
Query a table your data catalog already tracks, partitions and all
Push filtering and aggregation down to Athena so less data crosses the wire

Examples

Pick a table

sales.orders

The browser lists real databases and tables.

Custom query

SELECT region, SUM(total) FROM sales.orders GROUP BY region

Prune by partition

SELECT * FROM sales.orders WHERE dt = '2026-07-01'

Scans one partition instead of the table.

Tips

Press ⤢ beside SQL query for the SQL Studio: a full-screen editor that browses the connection's schemas, tables and columns and runs your query with Run to here without closing.
Athena bills by DATA SCANNED, so a WHERE on a partition column is the difference between cents and dollars. A Test run costs the same as a full run: it samples the result, not the scan.
This query is Athena SQL, the engine's own dialect, which is different from Trinium's row expressions.
Numbers and booleans come across natively; decimals, dates and timestamps arrive as text, so cast in SQL if you need them typed.
There is no Athena output node, by design: Athena has no bulk load. Write with the S3 File output (Parquet) or the Apache Iceberg output; Athena can query what either one writes.