Order To Restore Database Backups In

I’m often asked (both online and offline) once you have all your database backups, in what order to they need to be restored in?

I’ve actually asked this very question to senior level DBAs as an interview question before, and gotten some very interesting answers.

When restoring your database you start with your full backup, then restore your diffential backup (if you have taken one) then restore all the transaction log backups begining with the backup taken after the full (or differential) and going until the last transaction log backup available (or until you reach the point in time you want to stop the restore at).

Denny