8 Best Books for SQL For Beginners and Advanced Learners

Summary: This blog lists the best SQL books for beginners and advanced learners, essential for mastering SQL. It highlights vital books like “SQL Quick Start Guide” and “SQL Cookbook,” helping readers choose the best resources to improve their SQL skills and advance their Data Science careers

Introduction

SQL (Structured Query Language) is essential for managing and manipulating databases, making it a crucial skill in today’s data-driven world. Both beginners and advanced learners benefit significantly from mastering SQL. It enhances their ability to handle complex data tasks efficiently. 

Understanding SQL is indispensable whether entering the tech field or looking to advance your Data Science career. The following blog aims to provide a curated list of the best SQL books for beginners and advanced learners, helping you find the best book to learn SQL and excel in Data Science.

What is SQL Programming?

SQL, or Structured Query Language, is a standardised programming language for managing and manipulating relational databases. It allows users to create, read, update, and delete (CRUD) data within a database. SQL provides a systematic approach to querying and maintaining data, making it essential for database management.

Also Check: 

How do you drop a database on an SQL server?

Differences Between SQL and T-SQL. 

Overview of SQL’s Role in Database Management Systems

SQL plays a crucial role in database management systems (DBMS). It is the primary interface for interacting with the database, enabling users to execute commands to retrieve and manipulate data. 

DBMS, like MySQL, PostgreSQL, and Oracle, use SQL to manage the data’s structure and enforce data integrity. Through SQL, users can define database schemas, establish relationships between tables, and ensure data consistency across the system.

SQL operations are fundamental to database management. The core operations include:

• Querying: Extracting specific data by writing SELECT statements. For example, retrieving all customer records from a customer table.
• Updating: Modifying existing data using UPDATE statements. This can change data values based on specified criteria.
• Deleting: This operation removes data from tables with DELETE statements. It ensures that outdated or irrelevant data is purged.
• Inserting: Adding new data into tables using INSERT statements. This operation populates the database with new records.

Importance of SQL in Various Industries

SQL’s versatility makes it indispensable across various industries. SQL manages massive amounts of user data in tech, supporting software applications and services. In finance, SQL ensures the accurate and secure handling of transactional data. 

Healthcare relies on SQL to manage patient records, treatment histories, and other critical information. SQL’s ability to handle vast datasets efficiently and securely makes it a cornerstone in data management for these and many different sectors.

Must Read: Why is SQL important for Data Analyst?

Best Books for SQL

Knowing about the best SQL books is crucial for mastering database management. These books offer comprehensive knowledge, practical examples, and expert insights, helping beginners and advanced users enhance their SQL skills. By studying them, you can effectively manage, query, and analyse data, boosting your career opportunities in tech.

SQL: Quick Start Guide- The Simplified Beginner’s Guide to SQL 

If you’re a beginner in learning SQL, you must start with SQL Quick Start Guide- The Simplified Beginner’s Guide to SQL. One of the best SQL Books for beginners, the book would help you build a foundation on the topic. 

Furthermore, it would strengthen your skills as you move forward in your SQL journey. Significantly, you will learn concepts and many problems that may need to be solved. The book also provides step-by-step examples of how to learn and practice SQL queries. The topics covered in this book include the following:

• Relational databases and how they are structured
• Importance of SQL
• Fundamentals of SQL Syntax
• Learning complex SELECT statements

Sam’s Teach Yourself SQL in 10 Minutes

Teach Yourself SQL in 10 Minutes by Sam is the best book for learning SQL. The book helps enhance the competencies of students aspiring to learn SQL most effectively. Additionally, it includes twenty-two short and quick lessons, and you need to spend 10 minutes on each task. 

Accordingly, the book’s various topics include using joins, subqueries, stored procedures, cursors, triggers, and table constraints. The book significantly teaches simple data retrieval techniques to solve more complex problems. Here’s what you will learn from the book:

• Retrieving, sorting, and formatting database content
• Using the aggregate function to summarise data
• Join two or more tables
• Insert, update, and delete data
• Create and alter database tables

SQL All-in-One for Dummies 

SQL All-in-One for Dummies is another top SQL book for Beginners. A guidebook written by Allen G. Taylor, this book clearly explains SQL and relational databases. You will also learn about designing, developing, and maintaining databases in SQL. 

If you’re a beginner in SQL, this book is the most useful. Moreover, if you’re a Data Science enthusiast, this is the best SQL book for Data Science. The book will work as a reference guide while practically working with SQL. The covers topics which include the following:

• SQL queries
• Database security
• Error handling
• Database and query tuning
• SQL programming
• XML
• JSON.

Headfirst SQL 

Another SQL book for beginners is Headfirst SQL, enriched with all the essential topics you must learn from scratch. Effectively, the book teaches you the basics of SQL and includes all the concepts that will help your brain learn quickly. Therefore, this book covers database manipulation of indices, joins, and transactions. 

Accordingly, when you finish studying and learning from this book, you must practice writing SQL queries and joining data. Significantly, the book has been made highly challenging, engaging, and exciting, and it is a great way to learn and develop your skills. The book includes:

• SQL queries
• Simple to advance database manipulation
• SELECT and DELETE Queries
• Smart Table Design
• Multi-table database design
• SQL Joins
• And more

Learning SQL by Alan Beaulieu 

After you learn all about the basics of SQL and have gathered experience practicing basic-level SQL skills, it’s time to learn advanced SQL. Accordingly, the book by Alan Beaulieu on Learning SQL is an advanced-level book where you learn interactions of the datasets with queries. 

Additionally, you will learn about the need for and importance of subqueries. Significantly,  not only does it cover the basics of SQL, which will help you revise your skills, but it also contains advanced features. These are:

• SQL data statements to generate, manipulate, and retrieve data
• Creating database objects
• Converting and manipulating data with SQL’s built-in functions
• Conditional logic in data statements

SQL Cookbook 

SQL Cookbook is one of the best books for learning SQL to gain advanced and hardcore skill development in the language. Furthermore, you will learn advanced SQL techniques from experienced SQL developer Anthony Molinaro. 

These techniques help you become an expert-level SQL programmer in the market. Additionally, being the best SQL book for Data Science, you would familiarise yourself with concepts on window functions, database features, etc. Moreover, you will also learn:

• Complex questions, fixing, preparing data, manipulation, grouping, and reporting.
• SQL-PIVOT and UNPIVOT operators, oracle’s MODEL Clause, and PostgreSQL’s GENERATE_SERIES functions are specific database features.
• Window functions, pivoting rows and columns, reverse-pivoting columns into rows.
• Creating histograms, generating running totals and subtotals, etc.
• Walking string to use SQL for parsing through string characters, words, or delimited elements.

Also See: Overview of ROW_NUMBER Function in SQL. 

SQL Practice Problems 

Suppose you aspire to become a Data Scientist with advanced skills in SQL. In that case, you need experience solving real-world issues and problems. Accordingly, the best SQL book for you is SQL Practice Problems. 

Significantly, the book helps you learn to analyse data problems, figure out fundamentals, and more. It contains 58 practice problems, which require you to follow steps to solve the issues.

Moreover, solving complex-level problems would help you improve your capabilities in writing high-level SQL code. The book follows the method of learning by doing. Effectively, this would allow you to solve the most common problems you might be dealing with data. 

The book will help you learn unique techniques to solve them. Accordingly, whether you want to become a Data Scientist or a Data Engineer, learning SQL will help you solve real-world problems quickly.

SQL for Data Analytics

SQL for Data Analytics is another one of the best SQL books for beginners and advanced learners. The book consists of numerous concepts and learning techniques on SQL and offers multiple practice problems. The book presents itself in the friendliest language, allowing you to understand concepts and learn from a real-time instructor. 

This book covers everything from the fundamentals of SQL to advanced-level concepts. If you’re a Data Scientist who wants to expand your skills in SQL, the book will provide helpful tips. This is the best book for learning SQL, especially for experienced professionals. 

The book will enhance your skills in optimising queries, manipulating them, and extracting data from large datasets. You will learn to use SQL to analyse complex data and fine-tune questions. It will help you through case studies to visualise end-to-end Data Analytics processes.

Read More: 

Advanced SQL Tips and Tricks for Data Analysts.

SQL Interview Questions for Data Analyst 2023. 

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the best book for beginners to learn SQL?

“SQL Quick Start Guide—The Simplified Beginner’s Guide to SQL” is the best book for beginners. This book builds a strong foundation by explaining SQL concepts in an easy-to-understand manner. It provides step-by-step examples of SQL queries and covers fundamental topics like relational databases, SQL syntax, and complex SELECT statements.

Which SQL book is best for Data Science?

“SQL Cookbook” is the best SQL book for Data Science. It offers advanced techniques for handling complex queries, data manipulation, and reporting. Authored by experienced SQL developer Anthony Molinaro, it covers essential topics like window functions, pivoting, and database-specific features, making it invaluable for Data Scientists.

How can SQL enhance a Data Science career?

Mastering SQL enhances a Data Science career by improving data handling, querying, and analysis skills. SQL allows Data Scientists to manage, retrieve, and manipulate large datasets efficiently. These capabilities are crucial for analysing data trends, generating insights, and making data-driven decisions, thus increasing their effectiveness in their roles.

Wrapping Up

The above blog presents some of the best SQL books for beginners and advanced learners. Based on your experience level or professional expertise, you may choose from these books to develop your knowledge and skills in SQL. These best books for SQL will help you through your technical journey to becoming a Data Scientist, Data Analyst, or even Data Engineer. Remember, you should not just read the books but also engage in solving practice problems the books present to develop your practice experience.