In MySQL, by default, the username is root and there’s no password.

If during the installation process, you accidentally put a password in and don’t remember, here is how to reset the password:

  • Stop the MySQL server if it is running, then restart it with the –skip-grant-tables option.
sudo /usr/sbin/mysqld --skip-grant-tables --skip-networking &

It allows you to connect without a password and with all privileges and disables account-management statements such as ALTER USER and SET PASSWORD, which will be used later on to reset password. --skip-networking is enabled to automatically to prevent remote connections since it’s very insecure.

  • Then connect to the MySQL Server using the mysql client:
 mysql -u root
  • Then run this command to reload the grant tables:
FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
  • Now you can be able to set a new password for the root account:
ALTER USER 'root'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'new_password';

It’s done, stop the server and restart it normally. Now you can connect to the MySQL Server with the new password.


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