Derived Values with calculate()

calculate(expression: "...") computes a derived value server-side, so ratios, differences and percentages come back with the row instead of being assembled in your client.

buys:  count(if: { Side: { is: "Buy" } })
all:   count
ratio: calculate(expression: "$buys / $all")

$name refers to a response key

Inside an expression, $name refers to a key in the same selection set — the explicit alias when you give one, otherwise the field's own path with nested levels joined by underscore:

Selection	Reference
all: count	$all
Amounts { Base }	$Amounts_Base
q: Amounts { Base }	$q_Base

It reaches native fields, native metrics and other calculate results alike. The $ is required — a bare buys / all is passed through as raw column names and fails.

References are order-independent (a forward reference is fine) and chain to any depth. They compile to SQL aliases, so a self-reference fails with Code: 47 MISSING_COLUMNS and a mutual reference with Code: 174 CYCLIC_ALIASES.

When your query becomes aggregated

calculate never triggers a GROUP BY on its own. What matters is whether a native metric (count, sum, uniq, average, …) is present:

• No native metric — the query stays in row mode. A bare column reference such as "Amounts_Base" evaluates per row and works fine.
• A native metric is present — the API groups by the selected dimensions. Any bare column in your expression must now be one of those selected dimensions, or ClickHouse raises Code: 215 NOT_AN_AGGREGATE.

The error names the wrong field

Code: 215 names the dimension, not your expression — for example Column 'Price' is not under aggregate function and not in GROUP BY. The fix is usually to add a native metric, or to select the column your expression references.

An aggregate expression on its own is fine — calculate(expression: "sum(Amounts_Base)") with nothing else selected returns one row. It only needs a companion native metric once you also select a dimension.

What you can write

The expression is evaluated by ClickHouse, so the standard function library is available: arithmetic (+ - * / %), pow, sqrt, abs, log, round, greatest, least, conditionals (if, multiIf), aggregates (sum, count, avg, min, max, uniqExact, argMax, sumIf, countIf, quantile(0.5)(...)) and window forms such as row_number() OVER ().

buyShare: calculate(expression: "countIf(Side = 'Buy') / count()")

Use single quotes for SQL string literals — the expression is a GraphQL string, so a double quote must be escaped. Commas, nested parentheses, newlines and SQL comments are all fine.

Ranking by a derived value

orderBy accepts a calculate alias, and it composes with limitBy — this is the rank-by-derived-ratio pattern:

orderBy: { descendingByField: "buyShare" }
limitBy: { by: Pair_Token_Address, count: 1 }

calculate itself takes no selectWhere and no if: — expression is its only argument. To gate a ranked ratio, put a selectWhere floor on a sibling aggregate (for example count(selectWhere: { ge: "100" })) and apply the final cut on the ratio in your client.

Traps

Trap	Behaviour
Everything coerces to Float	The expression is wrapped in toFloat64(...) and the field's type is Float. A string-producing expression fails with Code: 6 unless the string parses as a number — toString(42) works, concat('a','b') does not
^ is not exponentiation	2^3 fails with Code: 62. Use pow(2,3)
The ternary ? : is unusable	? collides with the SQL builder's placeholder — not enough args when interpolating. Use if(cond, a, b)
Booleans and dates flatten	Bool → 1/0, DateTime → unix seconds, Date → days since epoch

Infinity, NaN and NULL are silently returned as 0

A divide-by-zero ratio comes back as 0, indistinguishable from a genuine zero — and under ascendingByField those rows sort first.

The values really are non-finite inside ClickHouse (isInfinite(count()/0) returns 1), so guard the denominator yourself:

safe: calculate(expression: "$numerator / nullIf($denominator, 0)")

In subscriptions

The grammar is much narrower on a stream: arithmetic only. Every function call — round(), floor(), abs() — returns null, and a single unsigiled reference makes the whole expression null with no error. See what does not survive streaming.

Related

• Expressions (general reference)
• Screeners with selectWhere
• Statistics