Diagnose cardinality errors in explain plan

Actual vs Estimated Row in Explain plan:

We can use several tools to see the internals of the SQL optimizer execution plan
details in Oracle database. These are:
 TKPROF (SQL*Trace) 10046
 SQL*Plus "set autotrace" or explain plan for <query>
 Extended execution plan statistics (v$sql_workarea)
We can use third party tools for the same.
Sometimes we may see number of rows are extremely high but cardinality is less for
the tables. This may be the issue with optimizer or stats collection. So you may have
following common question now.

“How do I know if the cardinality estimates in a plan are accurate?”

To find actual and estimated rows in explain plan, use “/*+ GATHER_PLAN_STATISTICS
*/”hint and execute the query and then run below command to find it.
Sample Example:

The Query:
SELECT /*+ GATHER_PLAN_STATISTICS */ MAX (to_number(ORDER_NO||PRE_ORDER_NO))
FROM ORDERS OR1
WHERE TRUNC(OR1.OR_EFFECTIVE_DATE_START) <='07-FEB-2018'
AND ( greatest (TRUNC(OR1.RECV_DATE),TRUNC(OR1.DATE_POSTED)) >= '01-JAN-
1995'
AND TRUNC(OR1.RECV_DATE) <= '07-FEB-2018' )
AND OR1.DELIVERY_STATUS = 'YES' ;

Collect explain plan after execution:

SQL> SELECT * FROM table(DBMS_XPLAN.DISPLAY_CURSOR(FORMAT=>'ALLSTATS LAST'));

PLAN_TABLE_OUTPUT
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SQL_ID 9ybvktk8n7d9v, child number 0
-------------------------------------
SELECT /*+ GATHER_PLAN_STATISTICS */ MAX (to_number(ORDER_NO||PRE_ORDER_NO))
FROM ORDERS OR1
WHERE
TRUNC(OR1.OR_EFFECTIVE_DATE_START) <=:"SYS_B_0"
AND ( greatest(TRUNC(OR1.RECV_DATE),TRUNC(OR1.DATE_POSTED)) >= :"SYS_B_1"
AND TRUNC(OR1.RECV_DATE) <= :"SYS_B_2" )
AND OR1.DELIVERY_STATUS =:"SYS_B_3"

Plan hash value: 1806674675

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| Id | Operation | Name | Starts | E-Rows | A-Rows | A-Time | Buffers |
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| 0 | SELECT STATEMENT | | 1 | | 1 |00:05:11.90 | 27 |
| 1 | SORT AGGREGATE | | 1 | 1 | 1 |00:05:11.90 | 27 |
| 2 | PX COORDINATOR | | 1 | | 32 |00:05:05.89 | 27 |
| 3 | PX SEND QC (RANDOM) | :TQ10000 | 0 | 1 | 0 |00:00:00.01 | 0 |
| 4 | SORT AGGREGATE | | 0 | 1 | 0 |00:00:00.01 | 0 |
| 5 | PX BLOCK ITERATOR | | 0 | 67667 | 0 |00:00:00.01 | 0 |
|* 6 | TABLE ACCESS FULL| ORDERS | 0 | 67667 | 0 |00:00:00.01 | 0 |
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Predicate Information (identified by operation id):

---------------------------------------------------

6 - access(:Z>=:Z AND :Z<=:Z)

filter(("OR1"."DELIVERY_STATUS"=:SYS_B_3 AND
GREATEST(TRUNC(INTERNAL_FUNCTION("OR1"."RECV_DATE")),TRUNC(INTERNAL_FUNCTION("OR1
"."DATE_POSTED")))>=:SYS_B_1 AND TRUNC(INTERNAL_FUNCTION("DM_EFFECTIVE_DATE_STAR
T"))<=:SYS_B_0 AND TRUNC(INTERNAL_FUNCTION("RECV_DATE"))<=:SYS_B_2))

Note
-----
- dynamic statistics used: dynamic sampling (level=AUTO)
- Degree of Parallelism is 32 because of table property

In order to see the A-Rows values for all of the operations in the plan you
would have to use the FORMAT value 'ALLSTATS ALL', which will show you
the execution statistics for ALL executions of the cursor.