> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.mindsdb.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Variables

MindsDB supports the usage of variables. Users can save values of API keys or other frequently used values and pass them as variables when creating knowledge bases, agents, or other MindsDB object.

## Usage

Here is how to create variables in MindsDB.

* Create variables using `SET` and save values either using the [`from_env()` function](/mindsdb_sql/functions/from_env) or directly.

```sql theme={null}
SET @my_env_var  = from_env("MDB_MY_ENV_VAR")

SET @my_value  = "123456"
```

* Use variables to pass parameters when creating objects in MindsDB.

Here is an example for [knowledge bases](/mindsdb_sql/knowledge_bases/overview).

```sql theme={null}
CREATE KNOWLEDGE_BASE my_kb
USING
    embedding_model = {
       "provider": "openai",
       "model_name" : "text-embedding-3-large",
       "api_key": @my_env_var
    },
    ...;
```