SQL and Chill: 5 Fun Datasets to Practice With on a Friday Night

Tired of boring practice datasets that make SQL feel like work? Kick back and sharpen your skills with five fun, quirky datasets that make learning SQL feel more like playing.

It’s Friday night. You’re not in the mood to go out, there’s nothing good left to stream, and your brain is craving something a little more satisfying than scrolling your phone. So you fire up your laptop, open your SQL editor, and settle in for a different kind of unwind.

SQL—Structured Query Language—is the language that powers data. It helps you pull insights from huge tables, spot patterns, and answer questions like “What’s our best-selling product this month?” or “Which pizza topping is the true crowd favorite?” SQL is everywhere—in business, in tech, in marketing—and in your future if you’re even a little data-curious.

But here’s the thing: learning SQL isn’t about memorizing commands. It’s about practice. Writing queries, running them, fixing them when they break, and celebrating those little “a-ha” moments when the results finally make sense. This means practice doesn’t have to feel like homework!

To prove it, we’ve gathered five fun, weird, and just plain interesting datasets to help you sharpen your SQL skills while actually enjoying the process. Think less corporate HR database, more UFO sightings and movie ratings.

And if you want to keep the momentum going, check out the SQL Practice track on LearnSQL.com. It’s an interactive learning path built for anyone who wants to stop reading about SQL and start doing it.

Let’s SQL and chill.

IMDb Movies Dataset

What’s in the Dataset? IMDb’s non-commercial datasets give you access to a wide range of movie-related information that’s perfect for exploring with SQL. The dataset includes multiple linked tables (in TSV format) that cover:

• Basic movie info: Titles, release years, genres, runtime, and whether it’s a movie, short, or TV episode.
• Ratings data: Average user ratings and number of votes per title.
• Crew details: Directors and writers connected to each movie.
• Cast info: Main actors and actresses and their roles.
• People profiles: Names, birth years, professions, and notable works.

Where to Get It: https://developer.imdb.com/non-commercial-datasets/

What SQL Concepts Can You Practice? IMDb offers a relational dataset with real-world complexity. It’s ideal for practicing joins, filters, grouping, and more while diving into the world of film.

• SELECT, WHERE, and filtering by text or number
• ORDER BY to rank movies by rating or popularity
• GROUP BY and aggregate functions (like AVG(), COUNT())
• LIMIT to find the top results
• Filtering with IN, BETWEEN, and LIKE

Fun Query Ideas:

• What are the 10 highest-rated comedies released after 2010?
• Who’s the most consistent director, delivering hit after hit without many flops?
• Which comedy sequels are rated higher than the original?
• Which actors have appeared in the most top-rated movies (e.g., IMDb rating > 8)?
• What are the longest movies ever made (and were they worth it)?

Recommended Skill Level: Beginner to Intermediate. Great for practicing core SQL skills with real-world data.

The Simpsons Episodes Dataset

What’s in the Dataset? The Simpsons is the longest-running animated sitcom in TV history, known for its quirky characters, sharp humor, and surprisingly deep social commentary. This dataset captures the essence of the show across more than 600 episodes, giving you a structured way to explore Springfield through data.

The dataset includes several linked tables:

• Episodes – Titles, air dates, seasons, episode numbers, and short descriptions.
• Characters – All the characters, from the Simpson family to obscure townsfolk, have a unique ID.
• Locations – Places featured in the show, like Moe’s Tavern, Springfield Elementary, and the Kwik-E-Mart.
• Script Lines – Over 150,000 lines of dialogue, with info on who said what, in which episode, and where it happened.

Where to Get It: https://www.kaggle.com/datasets/prashant111/the-simpsons-dataset

What SQL Concepts Can You Practice?

• Joining multiple tables (characters, episodes, locations, script lines)
• Filtering text with LIKE and LOWER()
• Counting and grouping with GROUP BY and COUNT()
• Finding unique values with DISTINCT
• Analyzing character appearances with ORDER BY and LIMIT

Fun Query Ideas:

• Which Simpsons season has the most episodes?
• Who talks more: Bart or Lisa?
• Are there characters that only appear in one episode?
• What are the 5 most frequently used locations in the show?
• What are the 10 words Homer uses the most?

Recommended Skill Level: Intermediate. This dataset is ideal if you’re comfortable with joins and ready to experiment with text data and multi-table queries in a fun setting.

LEGO Database

What’s in the Dataset? This dataset is built for brick lovers and data explorers alike. It covers decades of official LEGO sets, tracking everything from tiny parts to massive themed collections. The data is organized into relational tables, letting you explore how LEGO sets are built and cataloged. Tables include:

• Sets – Each LEGO set with its name, year of release, theme, and number of pieces.
• Parts – Every individual piece, with part numbers, names, and categories.
• Colors – A complete list of available LEGO brick colors, including RGB values.
• Inventories – Which parts appear in which sets, and in what quantity.
• Inventory Parts – Connects sets, parts, and colors—perfect for exploring how sets are constructed.
• Themes – The theme each set belongs to (e.g., Star Wars, Technic, City).

It’s a playful but rich dataset, ideal for querying real-world relationships and diving into the colorful world of LEGO from a database perspective.

Where to Get It:

• Kaggle dataset (last updated in 2017): https://www.kaggle.com/datasets/rtatman/lego-database
• Original dataset (updated daily): https://rebrickable.com/downloads/

What SQL Concepts Can You Practice?

• Multi-table JOINs (e.g., connecting sets, parts, inventories, and colors)
• Filtering with WHERE, IN, and BETWEEN
• Aggregating with GROUP BY, COUNT(), and SUM()
• Sorting with ORDER BY and limiting results with LIMIT
• Exploring hierarchies (e.g., themes within themes)

Fun Query Ideas:

• Which LEGO set has the most pieces?
• What are the 5 most common LEGO brick colors? What are the 5 least common?
• Which year had the most new LEGO sets released?
• Are there any parts that appear in only one set?
• Which themes have the highest average piece count per set?
• Which LEGO themes are the most colorful (i.e., based on the number of different brick colors used)?

Recommended Skill Level: Intermediate. It’s perfect if you’ve mastered the basics and want to get comfortable working with multiple related tables.

UFO Sightings

What’s in the Dataset? This quirky, one-of-a-kind dataset captures thousands of UFO sighting reports from the 20th century, as collected by the National UFO Reporting Center (NUFORC). Each record includes the date and time of the sighting; the city, state, and country where it happened; the reported shape of the UFO; how long it was visible, and even the witness’s description of the event. With over 80,000 entries—complete with coordinates—it’s the perfect playground for anyone curious about mysterious lights in the sky and what the data says about them.

Where to Get It: https://www.kaggle.com/datasets/NUFORC/ufo-sightings

What SQL Concepts Can You Practice?

• Filtering by date, time, and text using WHERE, LIKE, and BETWEEN
• Aggregations with COUNT(), AVG(), and GROUP BY
• Sorting with ORDER BY
• Working with geographic data (cities, states, countries)
• Basic data cleaning ideas (e.g., filtering out incomplete or outlier entries)

Fun Query Ideas:

• Which U.S. state had the most UFO sightings in the 1990s?
• What are the most common UFO shapes reported over time?
• Are there specific months with more sightings than others?
• What’s the average duration of a sighting by shape type?
• Which cities are UFO “hotspots” based on the number of reports?

Recommended Skill Level: Beginner to Intermediate. This is a great choice if you're comfortable with filtering and grouping and want to explore time-based and location-based data with a fun twist.

Your Own Netflix Wrapped

What’s in the Dataset? This dataset is a bit different because it’s yours. Unlike most public datasets, this one comes straight from your own Netflix account. In Netflix Wrapped With SQL, we show you exactly how to download your personal viewing history and turn it into something you can explore with SQL.

Many streaming platforms, like Netflix and Spotify, let you access your own data. It’s a great way to learn SQL with something you’re already connected to.

The Netflix viewing history file includes two main columns:

• Title – The name of the movie or episode you watched.
• Date – The exact date you watched it.

Simple, but powerful. With just this info, you can analyze your watching habits, spot patterns over time, and even answer questions you didn’t realize you had about your own screen time.

Where to Get It: Follow the instructions in our earlier article Netflix Wrapped With SQL.

What SQL Concepts Can You Practice?

• Filtering by date and title using WHERE, LIKE, and BETWEEN
• Aggregating with COUNT(), MAX(), AVG(), and GROUP BY to analyze viewing habits
• Sorting results with ORDER BY to find your most-watched shows or busiest days
• Working with date/time functions to extract months or weekdays or to calculate time gaps
• Basic text cleaning and formatting using string functions like SUBSTRING() or TRIM() for series names and episodes

Fun Query Ideas:

• Which TV series have you watched the most episodes of?
• Which month did you binge the most content on Netflix?
• What day of the week do you usually hit “Play”?
• What genres do you watch the most (if genre data is available)?
• On average, how often do you watch something—every day, every few days, or just on weekends?

Recommended Skill Level: Beginner to Intermediate. This is ideal for those familiar with basic SQL operations and looking to apply their skills to real-world, personalized data.

Bonus: Our SQL Practice Datasets Course

Want the freedom to explore SQL on your own, but with ready-to-use, well-organized databases? The SQL Practice Datasets course at LearnSQL.com gives you access to a variety of realistic databases from online stores, universities, museums, and music platforms. Unlike typical courses with step-by-step tasks, this one lets you roam freely. You’ll explore database structures on your own, come up with your own questions, and write queries to answer them.

The course databases include:

• A university system (students, courses, grades)
• An e-commerce store (orders, products, customers)
• Blog analytics (page views, user behavior)
• A digital music store (artists, albums, track purchases)
• The Museum of Modern Art (artworks and artists)

It’s perfect for practicing joining, grouping, filtering, and writing real-world SQL—without needing to set anything up.

Check out the course at: SQL Practice Datasets on LearnSQL.com

Ready to SQL and Chill?

Practicing SQL doesn’t have to feel like work—and it definitely doesn’t have to involve boring employee databases. Whether you’re into movies, UFO sightings, LEGO sets, or your own Netflix history, there’s a dataset out there that can make learning feel like play.

So the next time you’ve got a quiet evening, try running a few quirky queries instead of just scrolling. Who knows—you might just discover a new favorite way to unwind.

And if you want even more practice, check out our SQL Practice track. Your future SQL skills (and your resume) will thank you.