A method and apparatus for optimizing a backup chain using synthetic backups is described. In one embodiment, a method for creating synthetic incremental backups to optimize a backup chain comprises accessing a backup chain, which further comprises a plurality of incremental backups and determining schedule information defining a number of incremental backups to use to create one or more synthetic incremental backups representing the plurality of incremental backups from the backup chain, wherein the number of backups is defined by a numerical progression.