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A new era of SQL Server is here, and this latest edition of Grant Fritchey s best-selling dive into SQL Server query performance can ensure your queries keep up.
The fundamentals are still here: You ll learn how statistics and indexes impact performance, how to identify poorly performing queries, and how to discover effective solutions. But this new edition also includes advanced features unique to SQL Server 2025, such as AI integration for automatic tuning, insights on using extended events, automatic execution plan correction, and more. It s a must-have resource designed to empower you to troubleshoot slow-performing queries and make them run faster than ever.
The book is a treasure trove of instruction, insight, and advice. As you dive in, you ll encounter key fundamentals, from statistics and data distribution to cardinality and parameter sniffing, and learn to analyze and design your indexes and queries using best practices that prevent performance problems before they occur. You ll also explore advanced features like Query Store for managing and controlling execution plans, automated performance tuning, and memory-optimized OLTP tables and procedures and learn how SQL Server 2025 makes it all more powerful and automatable than ever.
What You Will Learn
- Use Query Store to understand and easily change query performance
- Recognize and eliminate bottlenecks leading to slow performance
- Tune queries whether on-premises, in containers, or on cloud platform providers
- Implement best practices in T-SQL to minimize performance risk
- Design in the performance that you need through careful query and index design
- Understand how built-in, automatic tuning can assist your performance enhancement efforts
- Protect query performance during upgrades to the newer versions of SQL Server
Who This Book Is ForDevelopers and database administrators with responsibility for query performance in SQL Server environments, and anyone responsible for writing or creating T-SQL queries and in need of insight into bottlenecks including how to identify them, understand them, and eliminate them
List of contents
1. Query Performance Tuning.- 2. Execution Plan Generation and the Query Optimizer.- 3. Methods for Capturing Query Performance Metrics.- 4. Analyzing Query Behavior Using Execution Plans.- 5. Statistics, Data Distribution, and Cardinality.- 6. Using Query Store for Query Performance and Execution Plans.- 7. Execution Plan Cache Behavior.- 8. Query Recompilation.- 9. Index Architecture.- 10. Index Behaviors.- 11. Key Lookups and Solutions.- 12. Dealing with Index Fragmentation.- 13. Parameter Sensitive Queries: Causes and Solutions.- 14. Query Design Analysis.- 15. Reduce Query Resource Use.- 16. Blocking and Blocked Processes.- 17. Causes and Solutions for Deadlocks.- 18. Row-By-Row Processing from Cursors and Other Causes.- 19. Memory-Optimized OLTP Tables and Procedures.- 20. Graph Databases.- 21. Intelligent Query Processing.- 22. Automated Tuning in Azure and SQL Server.- 23. A Query Tuning Methodology.
About the author
Grant Fritchey is a Microsoft Data Platform MVP and AWS Community Builder. He has more than 30 years of experience in IT technical support, development, and database administration. He currently works as Product Advocate at Red Gate Software. Grant writes articles for publication at SQL Server Central and Simple-Talk. He has published books, including SQL Server Execution Plans and SQL Server 2022 Query Performance Tuning (Apress). He has written chapters for Beginning SQL Server 2012 Administration (Apress), SQL Server Team-based Development, SQL Server MVP Deep Dives Volume 2, Pro SQL Server 2012 Practices (Apress), Expert Performance Indexing in SQL Server (Apress), and Query Store for SQL Server 2019 (Apress). Grant presents live sessions, virtual sessions, and recorded content online and in-person, around the world.
Summary
A new era of SQL Server is here, and this latest edition of Grant Fritchey’s best-selling dive into SQL Server query performance can ensure your queries keep up.
The fundamentals are still here: You’ll learn how statistics and indexes impact performance, how to identify poorly performing queries, and how to discover effective solutions. But this new edition also includes advanced features unique to SQL Server 2025, such as AI integration for automatic tuning, insights on using extended events, automatic execution plan correction, and more. It’s a must-have resource designed to empower you to troubleshoot slow-performing queries and make them run faster than ever.
The book is a treasure trove of instruction, insight, and advice. As you dive in, you’ll encounter key fundamentals, from statistics and data distribution to cardinality and parameter sniffing, and learn to analyze and design your indexes and queries using best practices that prevent performance problems before they occur. You’ll also explore advanced features like Query Store for managing and controlling execution plans, automated performance tuning, and memory-optimized OLTP tables and procedures—and learn how SQL Server 2025 makes it all more powerful and automatable than ever.
What You Will Learn
- Use Query Store to understand and easily change query performance
- Recognize and eliminate bottlenecks leading to slow performance
- Tune queries whether on-premises, in containers, or on cloud platform providers
- Implement best practices in T-SQL to minimize performance risk
- Design in the performance that you need through careful query and index design
- Understand how built-in, automatic tuning can assist your performance enhancement efforts
- Protect query performance during upgrades to the newer versions of SQL Server
Who This Book Is ForDevelopers and database administrators with responsibility for query performance in SQL Server environments, and anyone responsible for writing or creating T-SQL queries and in need of insight into bottlenecks—including how to identify them, understand them, and eliminate them
