Release: 2.1.0b1 | Release Date: January 21, 2026

# SQLAlchemy 2.1 Documentation

SQLAlchemy 1.4 / 2.0 Tutorial

This page is part of the SQLAlchemy Unified Tutorial.

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# Establishing Connectivity - the Engine

Welcome ORM and Core readers alike!

Every SQLAlchemy application that connects to a database needs to use an `Engine`. This short section is for everyone.

The start of any SQLAlchemy application is an object called the `Engine`. This object acts as a central source of connections to a particular database, providing both a factory as well as a holding space called a connection pool for these database connections. The engine is typically a global object created just once for a particular database server, and is configured using a URL string which will describe how it should connect to the database host or backend.

For this tutorial we will use an in-memory-only SQLite database. This is an easy way to test things without needing to have an actual pre-existing database set up. The `Engine` is created by using the `create_engine()` function:

    >>> from sqlalchemy import create_engine
    >>> engine = create_engine("sqlite+pysqlite:///:memory:", echo=True)

The main argument to `create_engine` is a string URL, above passed as the string `"sqlite+pysqlite:///:memory:"`. This string indicates to the `Engine` three important facts:

1. What kind of database are we communicating with? This is the `sqlite` portion above, which links in SQLAlchemy to an object known as the dialect.

2. What DBAPI are we using? The Python DBAPI is a third party driver that SQLAlchemy uses to interact with a particular database. In this case, we’re using the name `pysqlite`, which in modern Python use is the sqlite3 standard library interface for SQLite. If omitted, SQLAlchemy will use a default DBAPI for the particular database selected.

3. How do we locate the database? In this case, our URL includes the phrase `/:memory:`, which is an indicator to the `sqlite3` module that we will be using an in-memory-only database. This kind of database is perfect for experimenting as it does not require any server nor does it need to create new files.

We have also specified a parameter `create_engine.echo`, which will instruct the `Engine` to log all of the SQL it emits to a Python logger that will write to standard out. This flag is a shorthand way of setting up Python logging more formally and is useful for experimentation in scripts. Many of the SQL examples will include this SQL logging output beneath a `[SQL]` link that when clicked, will reveal the full SQL interaction.

SQLAlchemy 1.4 / 2.0 Tutorial

Next Tutorial Section: Working with Transactions and the DBAPI