22-25 April 2026

Brent Ozar

I make Microsoft SQL Server go faster. I love teaching, travel, cars, and laughing. Las Vegas, US. He/him.

Brent Ozar's Sessions

"But It Worked in Development!" 3 Hard Performance ProblemsSQLBits 2018

You've been performance tuning queries and indexes for a few years, but lately, you've been running into problems you can't explain. Could it be RESOURCE_SEMAPHORE, THREADPOOL, or lock escalation?

Easy Performance Tuning: an Intro to Wait StatisticsSQLBits 2015

You're a DBA who's struggled with Perfmon metrics and Profiler. You're facing a sea of confusing numbers, and you don't know where to focus first. Microsoft Certified Master Brent Ozar will give you a friendly introduction to wait statistics.

Cool Story, Bro: The DBAreactions Guide to SQL Server 2014SQLBits 2015

You're hearing a lot about the new features in SQL Server, but you're not hearing a lot about the drawbacks. Ever wonder why? Join Brent Ozar, the guy behind DBAreactions.com, for a sarcastic, funny look at SQL Server 2014's "features" and bugs.

How to Pick SQL Server HardwareSQLBits 2014

You don't buy a lot of servers, but you're about to deploy SQL Server, and you only get one chance to make it right. Brent Ozar will boil down everything you need to know into just a few simple decisions including SQL Edition, sockets, and RAM.

How the SQL Server Engine ThinksSQLBits 2014

How does SQL Server build results? We'll role play: Brent Ozar will be an end user sending in queries, and you'll be SQL Server. This session is for people who are comfortable writing queries, but not with indexes, statistics, and sargability.

Watch Brent Tune QueriesSQLBits 2014

Ever wonder how someone else does it? There’s no right way or wrong way, but in this session you can peer over Brent’s shoulder (virtually) while he takes a few Stack Overflow queries and tries various techniques to make them faster.

Virtualization and SAN Basics for DBAsSQLBits 2010

These two technologies can make a very big – and very bad – difference in how your SQL Server performs. Wouldn’t it be great if you could get the real, honest lowdown from a virtualization administrator, a SAN administrator, and a DBA? Wouldn’t it be even better if one person had done all three, and could give you the pros and cons of each point of view? That person is Brent Ozar, a Microsoft Certified Master who’s been there and done that.

SQL Server Storage - 1,000GB LevelSQLBits 2010

PANIC IN THE DATACENTER! Your databases are approaching - or surpassed - the Terrible Terabyte mark. You're pouring money into the SAN, but your data isn't pouring back out as fast as you want. You're terrified to DBCCs or index maintenance because everything takes forever, and you don't have big maintenance windows.

T-SQL Tuning with Colin Chapman, Enzo Ferrari, and The StigSQLBits 2009

Making your T-SQL fast isn't really all that different from building and driving race cars. Learn lessons from racing icons that you can apply right away in your databases.

Using Perfmon and ProfilerSQLBits 2009

Got a slow application or server, and not sure where to start? Brent will explain how to use the two most popular free tools and how to read their results.

20 Years of the Cloud: What Changed, What Didn’t, and What’s NextSQLBits 2026

Brent Ozar leads a panel of experienced data professionals reflecting on 20 years of the cloud. With no vendor marketing, they discuss what actually changed, which problems never went away, and what they expect to face in the next 20 years based on real-world experience.

AI in Your Career: Sidekick, Hero, or Villain?SQLBits 2026

Brent Ozar leads a panel discussion about how AI is reshaping data careers. Panelists share how they decide what to delegate to AI, how impacts differ by role, warning signs of over-automation, and how to intentionally cast AI as a sidekick, hero, or villain in your career.

Calling AI from T-SQL: Real-Life Lessons from sp_BlitzCacheSQLBits 2026

Brent Ozar cuts through AI hype with real-world lessons from calling LLMs inside sp_BlitzCache. Learn how to pick models, write effective prompts, pass the right context, handle failures, and use AI safely from your own stored procedures.

Dev-Prod Demon Hunters: Finding the Real Cause of Production SlownessSQLBits 2026

Brent Ozar loves K-Pop Demon Hunters, so this demo-driven class hunts down the real causes of production slowness. Watch dev and prod face off as Brent uncovers golden clues in plans, settings, and data that explain why the same query behaves so differently.

Pokémon Battle, Choose Your Index: You Can’t Have Them AllSQLBits 2026

In this demo-heavy, interactive session, Brent Ozar turns index tuning into a Pokémon-style battle. Using the Stack Overflow Users table, the audience plays index “cards” against real queries to see which designs win, lose, or backfire—and why you can’t have them all.

The Big Red Button: How to Use sp_KillSQLBits 2026

In this quick talk, Brent Ozar introduces sp_Kill, a safer alternative to restarting SQL Server during emergencies. Learn when to push the big red button, how to identify runaway sessions, and how to kill the right queries while logging everything for later analysis.

Watch Brent Tune a Query in SQL Server 2025SQLBits 2026

Ever wonder how somebody else does it? In this all-demo session, watch over Brent Ozar's shoulder while he takes a slow query, analyzes it, and iterates over several improvements. He'll explain his thought process and get feedback from the audience.

The Ascending Key ProblemSQLBits 2025

You're constantly loading new sales data in, but when users run reports for recent sales like today or yesterday, you get bad query plans. Fix it with trace flags 2389 and 4139.

Faster, Cheaper Cloud DatabasesSQLBits 2025

❓ You're managing databases that live in cloud whether it be AWS, Azure, and Google, and you're getting a lot of questions about slow performance and crazy costs. ❓Your users want everything faster and cheaper, and you're not finding good answers. Join me, Brent Ozar, for a day of real-time demos, honest war stories, and practical fixes.