Modern database systems use a query optimizer to identify the most efficient strategy, called “query execution plan”, to execute declarative SQL queries. The role of the query optimizer is especially critical for the complex decision-support queries featured in current data warehousing and data mining applications. Given an SQL query template that is parametrized on the selectivities of the participating base relations and a choice of query optimizer, a plan diagram is a color-coded pictorial enumeration of the execution plan choices of the optimizer over the query parameter space. Complementary to the plan-diagrams are cost and cardinality diagrams which graphically plot the estimated execution costs and cardinalities respectively, over the query parameter space. These diagrams are collectively known as optimizer diagrams. Optimizer diagrams have proved to be a powerful tool for the analysis and redesign of modern optimizers, and are gaining interest in diverse industrial and academic institutions. However, their utility is adversely impacted by the impractically large computational overheads incurred when standard brute-force approaches are used for producing fine-grained diagrams on high-dimensional query templates. In this thesis, we investigate strategies for efficiently producing close approximations to complex optimizer diagrams. Our techniques are customized for different classes of optimizers, ranging from the generic Class I optimizers that provide only the optimal plan for a query, to Class II optimizers that also support costing of sub-optimal plans and Class III optimizers which offer enumerated rank-ordered lists of plans in addition to both the former features. For approximating plan diagrams for Class I optimizers, we first present database oblivious techniques based on classical random sampling in conjunction with nearest neighbor (NN) inference scheme. Next we propose grid sampling algorithms which consider database specific knowledge such as(a) the structural differences between the operator trees of plans on the grid locations and (b) parametric query optimization principle. These algorithms become more efficient when modified to exploit the sub-optimal plan costing feature available with Class II optimizers. The final algorithm developed for Class III optimizers assume plan cost monotonicity and utilize the rank-ordered lists of plans to efficiently generate completely accurate optimizer diagrams. Subsequently, we provide a relaxed variant, which trades quality of approximation, for reduction in diagram generation overhead. Our proposed algorithms are capable of terminating according to user given error bound for plan diagram approximation. For approximating cost diagrams, our strategy is based on linear least square regression performed on a mathematical model of plan cost behavior over the parameter space, in conjunction with interpolation techniques. Game theoretic and linear programming approaches have been employed to further reduce the error in cost approximation. For approximating cardinality diagrams, we propose a novel parametrized mathematical model as a function of selectivities for characterizing query cardinality behavior. The complete cardinality model is constructed by clustering the data points according to their cardinality values and subsequently fitting the model through linear least square regression technique separately for each cluster. For non-sampled data points the cardinality values are estimated by first determining the cluster they belong to and then interpolating the cardinality value according to the suitable model. Extensive experimentation with a representative set of TPC-H and TPC-DS-based query templates on industrial-strength optimizers indicates that our techniques are capable of delivering 90% accurate optimizer diagrams while incurring no more than 20% of the computational overheads of the exhaustive approach. Infact, for full-featured optimizers, we can guarantee zero error optimizer diagrams which usually require less than 10% overheads. Our results exhibit that (a) the approximation is materially faithful to the features of the exact optimizer diagram, with the errors thinly spread across the picture and Largely confined to the plan transition boundaries and (b) the cost increase at the non-sampled point due to assignment of sub-optimal plan is also limited. These approximation techniques have been implemented in the publicly available Picasso optimizer visualizer tool. We have also modified PostgreSQL’s optimizer to incorporate costing of sub-optimal plans and enumerating rank-ordered lists of plans. In addition to these, we have designed estimators for predicting the time overhead involved in approximating optimizer diagrams with regard to user given error bounds. In summary, this thesis demonstrates that accurate approximations to exact optimizer diagrams can indeed be obtained cheaply and consistently, with typical overheads being an order of magnitude lower than the brute-force approach. We hope that our results will encourage database vendors to incorporate the foreign-plan-costing and plan-rank-list features in their optimizer APIs.