MySQL when a = 0, b = 0, but a <> b (binary)

Any idea of why this is so, CREATE TABLE f AS SELECT b'000000001' AS a, x'01' AS b; This creates two columns of a varbinary(2) NOT NULL, b varbinary(1) NOT NULL However, when I run, SELECT a=0, b=0, a=b, ab FROM f; +-----+-----+-----+------+ | a=0 | b=0 | a=b | ab | +-----+-----+-----+------+ | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | +-----+-----+-----+------+ What's going on here? From the [docs on *The BINARY and VARBINARY Types*,](https://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/8.0/en/binary-varbinary.html) > **All bytes are significant in comparisons, including ORDER BY and DISTINCT operations.** 0x00 bytes and spaces are different in comparisons, with 0x00 b, but why does a=0, or b=0 there?