With schema evolution enabled in Databricks Delta tables, when a new field is added to a record through a MERGE operation, Databricks automatically modifies the table schema to include the new field. In existing records where this new field is not present, Databricks will insert NULL values for that field. This ensures that the schema remains consistent across all records in the table, with the new field being present in every record, even if it is NULL for records that did not originally include it.
Reference:
Databricks documentation on schema evolution in Delta Lake: https://docs.databricks.com/delta/delta-batch.html#schema-evolution