Does an enum have any performance or consistency benefits over 1 or 3? (I discount 2 because it seems like the worst possible option.) It would seem like 1 is

Does an enum have any performance or consistency benefits over 1 or 3? (I discount 2 because it seems like the worst possible option.) It would seem like 1 is essentially an ad hoc enum with the same guarantees and 3 is just a bit easier to use as you can have the enum defined in your code rather than SQL.