Newb question here – when I define the maximum length of a VARCHAR column (say VARCHAR(16384) for instance), does each row necessarily occupy that number of characters? For instance, if I inserted a row with only 8000 characters (rather than 16,384) into that column, would the database still reserve the full 16384 bytes of storage space?

If the answer to the above is No, what are the downsides to setting the max allowable size (65,535) each time? Surely the mere option to store more characters cannot be a bad thing if there is no implication on storage space (except the additional byte after 255 character threshold). Many thanks.