Reading a clustered row

Using a CQL 3 schema, Cassandra’s storage engine uses compound columns to store clustered rows.

Using a CQL 3 schema, Cassandra’s storage engine uses compound columns to store clustered rows. All the logical rows with the same partition key get stored as a single, physical row. Within a partition, all rows are not equally expensive to query. The very beginning of the partition -- the first rows, clustered by your key definition -- is slightly less expensive to query because there is no need to consult the partition-level index. For more information about clustered rows, see Compound keys and clustering in Data Modeling.