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CMU 15-445 Intro to Database Systems: study plan and how long it takes

The CMU Database Group playlist is 25 videos and 33.7 hours long. Here's how long it takes at different paces, a week-by-week schedule built from the real videos, and a planner that turns it into your own daily plan.

25 videos · 33.7 hours · CMU Database Group

Andy Pavlo's CMU 15-445 is the best-known course on how databases work internally. The Fall 2025 lectures cover the relational model, storage and log-structured storage, buffer pools, indexes (B+trees, hash tables, vector and inverted indexes), query execution and optimization, concurrency control, logging and recovery, and distributed databases, with guest talks from industry.

It's about building a database, not using one, and pairs with the BusTub programming projects.

Who it's for: Programmers comfortable with C++ and systems concepts who want to understand database internals.

How long does it take?

The full playlist is 33.7 hours across 25 videos. Here's roughly how many days that is at different daily watch times and speeds, counting video time only:

Days to finish the playlist by daily watch time and playback speed
Daily timeAt 1xAt 1.5xAt 2x
30 min a day68 days45 days34 days
1 h a day34 days23 days17 days
2 h a day17 days12 days9 days

Make your own schedule

The playlist link is already filled in. Press Plan, set how much time you have each day and your speed, and you'll get a day-by-day schedule with a finish date and a calendar file. It reads the live playlist, so new videos are included.

Open on YouTube Track watched videos

Week-by-week schedule

A sample plan at 1 hour a day and normal speed, using whole videos so none is split across days. That's 4 weeks in total. For a different pace, start date or speed, use the planner above.

Week 1Videos 1–7 · 9h 11m

  1. Day 1 · 1h 15m

    • 1#01 - Relational Model & Algebra (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 15m

  2. Day 2 · 1h 18m

    • 2#02 - Modern SQL ✸ dbt Database Talk (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 18m

  3. Day 3 · 1h 17m

    • 3#03 - Database Storage: Files, Pages, Tuples (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 17m

  4. Day 4 · 1h 20m

    • 4#04 - Memory Management & Buffer Pools (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 20m

  5. Day 5 · 1h 19m

    • 5#05 - Log-Structured Database Storage ✸ SingleStore Database Talk (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 19m

  6. Day 6 · 1h 21m

    • 6#06 - Column-Store Databases (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 21m

  7. Day 7 · 1h 21m

    • 7#07 - Database Hash Tables ✸ YugabyteDB Database Talk (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 21m
Week 2Videos 8–14 · 9h 29m

  1. Day 8 · 1h 25m

    • 8#08 - B+Trees: The Best Data Structure in the World (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 25m

  2. Day 9 · 1h 23m

    • 9#09 - Vector Indexes + Inverted Indexes + Skip Lists + Bloom Filters (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 23m

  3. Day 10 · 1h 22m

    • 10#10 - Latching in Data Structures (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 22m

  4. Day 11 · 1h 20m

    • 11#11 - Sorting & Aggregation Algorithms ✸ MotherDuck Database Talk (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 20m

  5. Day 12 · 1h 19m

    • 12#12 - Hash Joins, Sort-Merge Joins, Nested Loop Join Algorithms (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 19m

  6. Day 13 · 1h 20m

    • 13#13 - Query Execution Part 1 (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 20m

  7. Day 14 · 1h 19m

    • 14#14 - Parallel Query Engine Architectures ✸ SpiralDB Database Talk (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 19m
Week 3Videos 15–21 · 9h 35m

  1. Day 15 · 1h 20m

    • 15#15 - Database Query Optimizers Part 1 (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 20m

  2. Day 16 · 1h 21m

    • 16#16 - Query Optimization Part 2 (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 21m

  3. Day 17 · 1h 21m

    • 17#17 - Concurrency Control Theory (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 21m

  4. Day 18 · 1h 23m

    • 18#18 - Transactions with Two-Phase Locking ✸ Firebolt Database Talk (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 23m

  5. Day 19 · 1h 25m

    • 19#19 - Timestamp Ordering Concurrency Control (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 25m

  6. Day 20 · 1h 23m

    • 20#20 - MVCC: Multi-Version Concurrency Control (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 23m

  7. Day 21 · 1h 22m

    • 21#21 - Write-Ahead Logging + Shadow Paging (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 22m
Week 4Videos 22–25 · 5h 28m

  1. Day 22 · 1h 18m

    • 22#22 - Database Crash Recovery ✸ ClickHouse Database Talk (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 18m

  2. Day 23 · 1h 25m

    • 23#23 - Distributed Databases Pt. 1 (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 25m

  3. Day 24 · 1h 19m

    • 24#24 - Distributed Databases Pt. 2 (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 19m

  4. Day 25 · 1h 26m

    • 25#25 - Databricks + Yellowbrick + ClickHouse ✸ RelationalAI DB Talk (CMU Intro to Database Systems)1h 26m

Tips for finishing

  • Do the BusTub projects from the course site. They take far longer than the lectures and teach the most.
  • Watch at 1.25x; Andy talks fast but the slides are dense, so pause rather than speeding up further.

Frequently asked questions

How long does it take to finish CMU 15-445 Intro to Database Systems?

The playlist has 25 videos and 33.7 hours of content. At 1 hour a day that's about 34 days at normal speed, or 23 days at 1.5x. At 2 hours a day it's about 17 days.

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