MySQL Error: : ‘Access denied for user ‘root’@’localhost’

by

Consider:

./mysqladmin -u root -p** '_redacted_'

Output (including typing the password):

Enter password:

mysqladmin: connect to server at ‘localhost’ failed error:
‘Access denied for user ‘root’@’localhost’ (using password: YES)’

How can I fix this?

26 Answers
26

All solutions I found were much more complex than necessary and none worked for me. Here is the solution that solved my problem. There isn’t any need to restart mysqld or start it with special privileges.

sudo mysql

-- for MySQL
ALTER USER 'root'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED WITH mysql_native_password BY 'root';

-- for MariaDB
ALTER USER 'root'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED VIA mysql_native_password USING PASSWORD('root');

With a single query we are changing the auth_plugin to mysql_native_password and setting the root password to root (feel free to change it in the query).

Now you should be able to log in with root. More information can be found in MySQL documentation or MariaDB documentation.

(Exit the MySQL console with Ctrl + D or by typing exit.)

Leave a Comment