diff --git a/luigi/db_task_history.py b/luigi/db_task_history.py
index 6847c71f6d..187f21e7ad 100644
--- a/luigi/db_task_history.py
+++ b/luigi/db_task_history.py
@@ -49,10 +49,19 @@
 import sqlalchemy.orm
 import sqlalchemy.orm.collections
 from sqlalchemy.engine import reflection
+
 Base = sqlalchemy.ext.declarative.declarative_base()
 
 logger = logging.getLogger('luigi-interface')
 
+if sqlalchemy.__version__.startswith('2'):
+    logger.warning('SQLAlchemy 2.x is not tested with luigi.db_task_history.DbTaskHistory')
+    from sqlalchemy import text
+
+else:
+    def text(sql):
+        return sql
+
 
 class DbTaskHistory(task_history.TaskHistory):
     """
@@ -258,25 +267,26 @@ def _upgrade_schema(engine):
         # Upgrade 1.  Add task_id column and index to tasks
         if 'task_id' not in [x['name'] for x in inspector.get_columns('tasks')]:
             logger.warning('Upgrading DbTaskHistory schema: Adding tasks.task_id')
-            conn.execute('ALTER TABLE tasks ADD COLUMN task_id VARCHAR(200)')
-            conn.execute('CREATE INDEX ix_task_id ON tasks (task_id)')
+            conn.execute(text('ALTER TABLE tasks ADD COLUMN task_id VARCHAR(200)'))
+            conn.execute(text('CREATE INDEX ix_task_id ON tasks (task_id)'))
 
         # Upgrade 2. Alter value column to be TEXT, note that this is idempotent so no if-guard
         if 'mysql' in engine.dialect.name:
-            conn.execute('ALTER TABLE task_parameters MODIFY COLUMN value TEXT')
+            conn.execute(text('ALTER TABLE task_parameters MODIFY COLUMN value TEXT'))
         elif 'oracle' in engine.dialect.name:
-            conn.execute('ALTER TABLE task_parameters MODIFY value TEXT')
+            conn.execute(text('ALTER TABLE task_parameters MODIFY value TEXT'))
         elif 'mssql' in engine.dialect.name:
-            conn.execute('ALTER TABLE task_parameters ALTER COLUMN value TEXT')
+            conn.execute(text('ALTER TABLE task_parameters ALTER COLUMN value TEXT'))
         elif 'postgresql' in engine.dialect.name:
             if str([x for x in inspector.get_columns('task_parameters')
                     if x['name'] == 'value'][0]['type']) != 'TEXT':
-                conn.execute('ALTER TABLE task_parameters ALTER COLUMN value TYPE TEXT')
+                conn.execute(text('ALTER TABLE task_parameters ALTER COLUMN value TYPE TEXT'))
         elif 'sqlite' in engine.dialect.name:
             # SQLite does not support changing column types. A database file will need
             # to be used to pickup this migration change.
-            for i in conn.execute('PRAGMA table_info(task_parameters);').fetchall():
-                if i['name'] == 'value' and i['type'] != 'TEXT':
+            for i in conn.execute(text('PRAGMA table_info(task_parameters);')).fetchall():
+                x = i._asdict()
+                if x['name'] == 'value' and x['type'] != 'TEXT':
                     logger.warning(
                         'SQLite can not change column types. Please use a new database '
                         'to pickup column type changes.'
diff --git a/tox.ini b/tox.ini
index 2cf6e69e99..abb1092115 100644
--- a/tox.ini
+++ b/tox.ini
@@ -33,7 +33,7 @@ deps =
     boto3>=1.11.0
     pyhive[presto]==0.6.1
     s3transfer>=0.3,<4.0
-    sqlalchemy<1.4
+    sqlalchemy<2.1
     elasticsearch>=1.0.0,<2.0.0
     psutil<4.0
     cdh,hdp: hdfs>=2.0.4,<3.0.0