phpMyAdmin: A Simple Guide to Managing MySQL Databases

phpMyAdmin is a free, open-source tool for managing MySQL and MariaDB databases through a web browser. It supports a wide range of operations, from managing databases, tables, columns, relations, indexes, users, and permissions to running any SQL statement directly. It also comes with documentation maintained by a large, multi-language community. If you are new to databases, start with our What is SQL guide.

phpMyAdmin covers the tasks you use most: browsing, creating, changing, and deleting MySQL databases, tables, fields, and records, and managing MySQL users and their privileges. Its import feature makes it easy to restore a database from a backup — you can import a SQL or CSV dump with a couple of mouse clicks. Likewise, you can export your database to CSV, SQL, XML, Excel, and other common formats just as easily.

Features of phpMyAdmin

• Intuitive web interface
• Support for most MySQL features:
  • Browse and drop databases, tables, views, fields, and indexes.
  • Create, copy, drop, rename, and alter databases, tables, fields, and records.
  • Maintain servers, databases, and tables, with suggestions on server configuration.
  • Execute, edit, and bookmark any SQL statement, even batch queries.
  • Manage MySQL user accounts and privileges.
  • Manage stored procedures and triggers.
• Import data from CSV and SQL.
• Export data to various formats: CSV, SQL, XML, PDF, ISO/IEC 26300 (OpenDocument text and spreadsheet), Word, LaTeX, and others.
• Administer multiple servers.
• Create graphics of your database layout in various formats.
• Create complex queries using Query-by-Example (QBE).
• Search across a whole database or a subset of it.
• Transform stored data into any format using predefined functions, such as showing BLOB data as an image or download link.
• And many more features are available.

phpMyAdmin Built Into Hosting Control Panels

Many web hosting control panels, such as cPanel, include phpMyAdmin built in. If your hosting plan offers cPanel, you can open phpMyAdmin right from your hosting dashboard and manage your databases without installing anything yourself.

Requirements for Installation

Web Server

To install phpMyAdmin, you need a web server, such as Apache, Nginx, or IIS, to place phpMyAdmin’s files on.

PHP

• You need PHP 7.2.5 or newer, with session support, the Standard PHP Library (SPL) extension, and JSON support.
• To support uploading ZIP files, you need the PHP zip extension.
• You need GD2 support in PHP to display inline thumbnails of JPEGs (“image/jpeg: inline”).
• When using cookie authentication, the OpenSSL extension is strongly recommended.

Database

• MySQL 5.5 or newer
• MariaDB 5.5 or newer

Web Browser

To access phpMyAdmin, you need a web browser with cookies and JavaScript enabled.

Installation

phpMyAdmin does not add any special security to the MySQL database server on its own, so secure your MySQL setup first.

Installing on Windows

On Windows, the easiest way to get phpMyAdmin is to install it together with a local server package, which bundles the web server, PHP, MySQL, and phpMyAdmin in one setup.

Installing from Git:

git clone https://github.com/phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin.git

Installing using Composer:

composer create-project phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin

Installing using Docker:

docker pull phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin

Download and Reference

You can download the latest released versions from phpmyadmin.net.

Tip: Shortcut keys

k toggles the console; h goes to the home page; s opens settings; d then s goes to database structure; d then f searches the database; t then s goes to table structure; t then f searches the table; Backspace takes you back to the previous page.

phpMyAdmin makes database management simple, even if you are just starting out. To strengthen your database basics first, read our What is SQL guide.