We’re humans, and we forget stuff… when we do, we tend to go back in time to remember what was forgotten. The same is true with passwords. We do forgot a lot when it comes to passwords… and that’s why there are countless password managers to help us manage our passwords.

Forgetting your desktop password is one thing… however, fogetting the root password to your MySQL database in production is totally another thing and not fun…. and if you did, then you’re in the right place… the steps below will show you how to quickly reset the root password to your MySQL database server…

This brief tutorial is going to show students and new users how to quickly regain access to MySQL databases by resetting the root password.

When you’re ready to reset the root password for MysQL, continue with the steps below

Setting MySQL Root Password

To reset MySQL root password, logon to the Ubuntu server and run the commands below to stop MySQL database service

sudo /etc/init.d/mysql stop

Then run the commands below to create a new mysqld directory

sudo mkdir /var/run/mysqld/

and give mysql user access to it.

sudo chown mysql /var/run/mysqld/

After that, run the commands below to start MySQL in safe mode by bypassing the standard authentication process..

sudo mysqld_safe --skip-grant-tables &

You should see something like this… you may have to press the Enter key…

richard@ubuntu1710:~$ 2017-12-25T16:49:30.551520Z mysqld_safe Logging to syslog.
2017-12-25T16:49:30.554646Z mysqld_safe Logging to '/var/log/mysql/error.log'.
2017-12-25T16:49:30.578079Z mysqld_safe Starting mysqld daemon with databases from /var/lib/mysql
2017-12-25T16:49:32.568746Z mysqld_safe mysqld from pid file /var/run/mysqld/mysqld.pid ended

[1]+  Done                    sudo mysqld_safe --skip-grant-tables

Next, run the commands below to logon to the database server with the root account without typing a password… you’re given root access to the database without entering the password…

sudo mysql -u root

Once logged into the database, run the SQL command statement below to use the default mysql database… this database holds the settings for root user and other server settings…

use mysql;

The output should look like the one below:

mysql> use mysql;
Reading table information for completion of table and column names
You can turn off this feature to get a quicker startup with -A

Database changed

Finally, run the SQL statement below to change the root password

update user set authentication_string=PASSWORD("New_Passwore_Here") where User='root';

Save the change by running the commands below

flush privileges;
exit;

Finally, stop MySQL safe_mode and start MySQL default service

sudo /etc/init.d/mysql stop
sudo /etc/init.d/mysql start

If you did everything as described above, you should be able to log back onto MySQL database using the root new password.

sudo mysql -u root -p

Enjoy!

Welcome to the MySQL monitor.  Commands end with ; or \g.
Your MySQL connection id is 5
Server version: 5.7.20-0ubuntu0.17.10.1 (Ubuntu)

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Oracle is a registered trademark of Oracle Corporation and/or its
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owners.

Type 'help;' or '\h' for help. Type '\c' to clear the current input statement.

This is how one resets MySQL root user.

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