diff --git a/apps/api/app/core/db.py b/apps/api/app/core/db.py
index 3244199..1dec5a5 100644
--- a/apps/api/app/core/db.py
+++ b/apps/api/app/core/db.py
@@ -3,7 +3,19 @@
 
 from .config import settings
 
-engine = create_engine(settings.database_url, future=True)
+
+def _normalize_db_url(url: str) -> str:
+    # psycopg v3 (installed via psycopg[binary]) requires the
+    # "postgresql+psycopg://" scheme. SQLAlchemy defaults the bare
+    # "postgresql://"/"postgres://" scheme to psycopg2, which is not installed.
+    if url.startswith("postgres://"):
+        url = "postgresql://" + url[len("postgres://"):]
+    if url.startswith("postgresql://"):
+        url = "postgresql+psycopg://" + url[len("postgresql://"):]
+    return url
+
+
+engine = create_engine(_normalize_db_url(settings.database_url), future=True)
 SessionLocal = sessionmaker(bind=engine, autoflush=False, autocommit=False, future=True)
 Base = declarative_base()