diff --git a/UPGRADE.md b/UPGRADE.md
index 2d5e11b6018..8719658d65b 100644
--- a/UPGRADE.md
+++ b/UPGRADE.md
@@ -357,6 +357,7 @@ Every non-abstract schema manager class must implement them in order to satisfy
 # BC Break: The number of affected rows is returned as `int|string`
 
 The signatures of the methods returning the number of affected rows changed as returning `int|string` instead of `int`.
+If the number is greater than `PHP_INT_MAX`, the number of affected rows may be returned as a string if the driver supports it.
 
 # BC Break: Dropped support for `collate` option for MySQL
 
diff --git a/src/Driver/Connection.php b/src/Driver/Connection.php
index 7af48ab52ba..f5229a2d298 100644
--- a/src/Driver/Connection.php
+++ b/src/Driver/Connection.php
@@ -36,6 +36,8 @@ public function quote(string $value): string;
 
     /**
      * Executes an SQL statement and return the number of affected rows.
+     * If the number of affected rows is greater than the maximum int value (PHP_INT_MAX),
+     * the number of affected rows may be returned as a string.
      *
      * @throws Exception
      */
diff --git a/src/Driver/OCI8/Connection.php b/src/Driver/OCI8/Connection.php
index 3652ca0eb85..49923828aa2 100644
--- a/src/Driver/OCI8/Connection.php
+++ b/src/Driver/OCI8/Connection.php
@@ -78,7 +78,7 @@ public function quote(string $value): string
      * @throws Exception
      * @throws Parser\Exception
      */
-    public function exec(string $sql): int|string
+    public function exec(string $sql): int
     {
         return $this->prepare($sql)->execute()->rowCount();
     }
diff --git a/src/Driver/PDO/Connection.php b/src/Driver/PDO/Connection.php
index 7446b4a1d08..33e298079c4 100644
--- a/src/Driver/PDO/Connection.php
+++ b/src/Driver/PDO/Connection.php
@@ -21,7 +21,7 @@ public function __construct(private readonly PDO $connection)
         $connection->setAttribute(PDO::ATTR_ERRMODE, PDO::ERRMODE_EXCEPTION);
     }
 
-    public function exec(string $sql): int|string
+    public function exec(string $sql): int
     {
         try {
             $result = $this->connection->exec($sql);
diff --git a/src/Driver/SQLSrv/Connection.php b/src/Driver/SQLSrv/Connection.php
index 44629ec5f04..71050f17a3e 100644
--- a/src/Driver/SQLSrv/Connection.php
+++ b/src/Driver/SQLSrv/Connection.php
@@ -49,7 +49,7 @@ public function quote(string $value): string
         return "'" . str_replace("'", "''", $value) . "'";
     }
 
-    public function exec(string $sql): int|string
+    public function exec(string $sql): int
     {
         $stmt = sqlsrv_query($this->connection, $sql);