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WPBeginner» Blog» Beginners Guide» How to Reset a WordPress Password from phpMyAdmin

How to Reset a WordPress Password from phpMyAdmin

Last updated on June 26th, 2017 by Editorial Staff
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How to Reset a WordPress Password from phpMyAdmin

Do you want to reset your WordPress password using phpMyAdmin? If you are unable to reset your WordPress password, then there is a way to reset it directly in your WordPress database using phpMyAdmin. In this article, we will show you how to easily reset a WordPress password from phpMyAdmin.

Reset your WordPress password from phpMyAdmin

Why Reset WordPress Password from phpMyAdmin

WordPress makes it super easy to reset your password. You can simply go to the login screen and click on the ‘Lost your password’ link.

Recovering lost password in WordPress

Clicking on it takes you to password reset page where you can enter your username or email address to reset the password. After that WordPress sends a password reset link to the email address associated with that user account. For more details see our guide on how to recover a lost password in WordPress.

However, if you don’t have access to the email address, or your WordPress site fails to send an email, then you will not be able to reset your password.

In such a situation, you will need to reset your WordPress password directly in the database. The easiest way to do that is by using phpMyAdmin.

Having said that, let’s see how you can easily reset a WordPress password from phpMyAdmin.

How to WordPress Password From PhpMyAdmin

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If you don’t want to watch the video tutorial, then you can continue reading the text version below:

First you need to login to the cPanel dashboard of your WordPress hosting account. Next, you need to click on the phpMyAdmin icon under the database section.

phpMyAdmin in cPanel

This will launch the phpMyAdmin app where you need to select your WordPress database.

Select your WordPress database

You will now see the list of tables in your WordPress database. Now you need to look for the ‘{table-prefix}_users’ table in this list and click on the ‘Browse’ link next to it.

Browse users table in phpMyAdmin

Note: Table names in your WordPress database may have a different table prefix than the one we are showing in our screenshot.

You will now see the rows in your WordPress users table. Go ahead and click on the edit button next to the username where you want to change the password.

Editing user in phpMyAdmin

PhpMyAdmin will show you a form with all the user information fields.

You will need to delete the value in the user_pass field and replace it with your new password. Under the function column, select MD5 from the drop down menu and click on the Go button.

Change your password

Your password will be encrypted using the MD5 hash and then it will be stored in the database.

Congratulations! You have successfully changed your WordPress password using phpMyAdmin.

Now some of you may be wondering why did we select the MD5 hash to encrypt the password.

In the older version, WordPress used MD5 hash to encrypt passwords. Since WordPress 2.5, it started using stronger encryption technologies. However, WordPress still recognizes MD5 to provide backward compatibility.

As soon as you login using a password string stored as a MD5 hash, WordPress recognizes it and changes it using the newer encryption algorithms.

We hope this article helped you learn how to reset a WordPress password from phpMyAdmin. You may also want to see our ultimate step by step WordPress security guide to keep your WordPress site safe.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

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About the Editorial Staff

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175 Comments

Leave a Reply
  1. Blessing Mashoko says:
    Apr 18, 2018 at 6:18 am

    Works like a charm

    Reply
  2. Natty Honeycomb says:
    Apr 14, 2018 at 7:13 pm

    Thank you so much! I can’t believe I didn’t know my email address anymore!

    Reply
  3. Liang Huang says:
    Mar 7, 2018 at 11:09 am

    Thank you so much. The instructions were easy enough to follow. God bless you

    Reply
  4. Sonu says:
    Feb 24, 2018 at 2:11 am

    Really Helpfull

    Reply
  5. Luke says:
    Feb 22, 2018 at 6:44 pm

    I have no WP_users at all. What do I do?

    Reply
  6. Abhishek Rawal says:
    Feb 14, 2018 at 1:27 am

    Thank You so much!
    Worked like a charm

    Reply
  7. Stegemüller says:
    Dec 13, 2017 at 10:48 am

    I have fighting with passwords for hours. Then I found this guide and I was home free. Thank you very much.

    Best regards,
    Hanne B. Stegemüller,
    Denmark

    Reply
  8. Birgit says:
    Nov 14, 2017 at 12:56 pm

    Super! Helped me a lot.

    Reply
  9. Harsha says:
    Oct 27, 2017 at 7:08 am

    Thank you!

    Reply
  10. Aarthi Rengaraj says:
    Oct 23, 2017 at 1:41 pm

    Perfect tips and was very helpful in getting my client’s domains password changed. I was struggling and that “MD5” tag thing was actually missing. Thanks so much. This is the best place for any WordPress queries.

    Reply
  11. Susan says:
    Oct 11, 2017 at 11:12 pm

    I am locked out of WordPress, my site is down. I can go into my c-panel. If I change the password to an encrypted password, do I now copy that and use it to log in? I really don’t get it? It is encrypted isn’t it? What do I now use to log into my WordPress? Do I use the log in name and email that is there in the c-panel?
    Thanks

    Reply
    • Charles Allen says:
      Nov 12, 2017 at 2:18 pm

      Susan, the MD5 is like a secret recipe where one ingredient is missing. Let’s say we are pen pals and we are going to meet for the very first time. Since I have never seen you, I need a way to know that it is really you. One way to do this if you can send me a piece of homemade cake and a list of all but one secret ingredient. When we first meet, you will finally tell me what the secret ingredient is, and then I will bake my own cake with the exact recipe. If the cake I makes is exactly same as the cake you sent me, then I know you are really my pen pal. The MD5 is the completed cake, and the plain password you came up with is the secret ingredient. When you send the password to WordPress, it will use your secrete password ingredient to see if it can bake its own MD5 cake. When you log into WP, use the plain text password. Your WP user name is usually different from your cPanel name. If you forgot your user name, it will be listed as “user_login” in the database.

      Reply
  12. Jivanti says:
    Sep 19, 2017 at 1:07 pm

    Hello there,

    I seem to be getting the username is invalid commad everytime I try to login.
    But the username and password is correct. It seemed like I might have created a different user name the first time I got locked out of my account. Or I forgot to renew my domain. I really can’t remember.

    When I use a different username, I’m able to log in into WP dashboard and do theme changes but it is not reflecting in my current website.

    The current dashboard does not have any of my old post or images.

    I logged into to my cpanel and checked under the myphpadmin, there is 2 database. One of it contain the old posts and images. I tried the above method using the MD5, I’m still unable to acess the old user id and my old post.

    I suspect the current active site is configured at the old database.

    Another question, when I reset the password through MD5, do I copy this same new rest password that was generated in the phpadmin screen ( the long one) and paste it in the wp login screen. I tried it. It didn’t work.

    Please help.

    Reply
  13. Randy says:
    Aug 29, 2017 at 8:06 am

    Works well.. Thank you!

    Reply
  14. slim says:
    Aug 25, 2017 at 5:35 pm

    i just followed the process but it did not work out

    Reply
    • hendryhowser says:
      Sep 16, 2017 at 4:08 am

      make sure your user_login is the same as user_nicename.

      Reply
  15. david h says:
    Aug 17, 2017 at 7:58 am

    Great help – thanks!

    Reply
  16. Eduardo Alfaro says:
    Aug 10, 2017 at 6:04 am

    Thank you very much guys! this was great

    Reply
  17. Harry says:
    Jul 16, 2017 at 3:49 am

    Sir I was changed my wordpress admin password in the same way but now it my dashboard is not opening it is showing a wrong password but I have changed it. Sir please help me………

    Reply
  18. yuseph says:
    Jul 2, 2017 at 10:28 am

    I tried to do it without choosing md5 and it won’t do it. Thanks much appreciated

    Reply
  19. Spock says:
    Jun 30, 2017 at 5:14 pm

    Good advice, but spoken too rapidly. Slow down the delivery.

    Reply
  20. Charlie Sasser says:
    Jun 28, 2017 at 10:32 pm

    An easier way is to use phpadmin and just change the email address to your current email and then go to regular login and click on “Forgot Password” and reset from email link. No need to worry about MP5 and all that stuff.

    Reply
    • WPBeginner Support says:
      Jun 29, 2017 at 5:33 pm

      This wouldn’t work if WordPress is unable to send password reset emails.

      Reply
  21. Greg says:
    Jun 27, 2017 at 5:15 am

    Thank you for the MD5 function in phpmyadmin.
    Very helpful to me.

    Reply
  22. Akash says:
    Jun 26, 2017 at 9:38 pm

    but im using defult url is it safe or not for my site

    Reply
  23. John says:
    Jun 26, 2017 at 7:46 pm

    I wish people who make training videos would slow down they are always rushing through it as if they have a train to catch, So slow down and you will have great training videos…

    Reply
  24. Dee says:
    Jun 26, 2017 at 7:26 pm

    Just wanted to say tell you how great your daily email is! Thanks :)

    Reply
    • Editorial Staff says:
      Jun 26, 2017 at 8:26 pm

      Thanks Dee :)

      Reply
  25. Peter says:
    Jun 26, 2017 at 10:13 am

    I don´t know what kind of hash it is, but it´s not default form of MD5. WordPress password hasher does the job fine.

    Reply
  26. Darshan Krishnan says:
    May 31, 2017 at 8:10 am

    Thank you very much, Syed and team WPBeginner.
    My site was put in maintenance mode and hence password reset option did not work.
    I changed the password as you suggested and everything is back to normal.
    Much thanks for the awesome content. :)

    Reply
  27. Manoj says:
    May 25, 2017 at 10:55 pm

    Really would like to say thank you as I find it really hard to change the password of my site

    Reply
  28. John says:
    May 25, 2017 at 9:23 am

    Awesome, thank you very much this has been a massive help

    Reply
  29. Ssk says:
    May 16, 2017 at 5:02 am

    Awesome! Helped me reset my password when I kept getting the “Host disabled the mail () function” error.

    Reply
  30. Luis says:
    Apr 19, 2017 at 6:20 pm

    Hi! I’m s using mamp as local host, and i’m having some troubles with it: I can’t recover my wordpress password by setting a new one on phpMyadmin. It shows that the password row has been updated to the new one I chose, but it is not recognized by wordpress.org when i try to log in. Can’t figure out what may be the problem. I’m giving up on hosting my site on MAMP. I’ve seen that I can create a new database with cPanel, since I’m paying for hosting service from namecheap. What do you suggest for starting a new project from zero? Thanks a lot!

    Reply
  31. Sieu Nguyen says:
    Mar 4, 2017 at 2:01 am

    Thanks you. I lost my password and I used this way to create a new password. :)

    Reply
  32. Benji says:
    Feb 28, 2017 at 7:14 am

    Unfortunately this isn’t working for me. I’m doing exactly what your asking, but when I made a new password using the MD5 Hash and copy and paste that new password in the field > save by hitting Go > then go to refresh my Website admin log in page, I enter the new password and still tells me I’ve entered the wrong password??? I’ve tried email recovery but never get sent an email… So painful!

    Any idea’s?

    Reply
    • Joe says:
      Jul 26, 2017 at 4:38 pm

      I’m getting this too, it is driving me mad! Would really appreciate some help on this

      Reply
      • Dave says:
        Mar 9, 2018 at 5:20 pm

        You don’t use the hashed password. Let’s say you set your new password to “letmeinalready,” choose MD5, and save it. You wouldn’t use that hashed password to get in – you’d use “letmeinalready”

        Reply
  33. Erik Chhuo says:
    Feb 27, 2017 at 11:32 am

    wow, this is way too fast a video clip for me. Just can’t follow any. Didn’t even where to start.

    Reply
  34. Karen says:
    Feb 20, 2017 at 11:50 pm

    Do you have to be logged into your admin to start with? I can’t even log in to do any of the above!!!

    Reply
  35. Heather says:
    Feb 2, 2017 at 11:15 am

    This is not working for me…still cannot login

    Reply
    • jan says:
      Feb 12, 2017 at 3:55 pm

      awesome, very old post, but still being read and replied to!

      I used Duplicator to copy a one-page WP-site to localhost (XAMPP). Made a new database as instructed, password and everything.

      When I try to enter local password (or is it the database password?), screen reverts to site published on cloud host.

      Localhost DB has two entries: for Duplicator (prefix 2ecxx_) and what I thought was local copy (prefix wp_). But the ‘local’ DB _wp entries are actually referring to the cloud hosting environment.

      Tried to change wp_user username en PW (MD5), but does not work

      Changed siteurl in _wp_options to localhost, does not help

      When I use 2eczz_users username and PW, page also moves back to site published in the cloud

      Reply
  36. stalony says:
    Jan 23, 2017 at 10:15 am

    Does this tutorial still relevant in 2017 ????

    Reply
    • WPBeginner Support says:
      Jan 23, 2017 at 4:26 pm

      Yes, it is.

      Reply
  37. Mohamed Gees says:
    Jan 18, 2017 at 2:52 pm

    Thanks A lot, VERY INFORMATIVE ARTICLE, i was up and down last two days. . you saved me. Thanks again

    Reply
  38. Ringo says:
    Dec 28, 2016 at 1:52 pm

    Really would like to say thank you as I find it really hard to change the password of my site

    Reply
  39. Qamar Naveed says:
    Dec 23, 2016 at 1:19 pm

    Very informative article, i was stuck at database name, finally found with the help of this article.

    Reply
  40. Rachel Ortiz says:
    Dec 22, 2016 at 8:39 am

    Thanks so much. I am NOT a programmer whatsoever and these instructions were easy enough for me to get. This was a lifesaver.

    Reply
  41. Kareem Said says:
    Dec 13, 2016 at 4:31 pm

    Thanks for the MD5 tip

    Reply
  42. Denis says:
    Dec 1, 2016 at 1:00 pm

    This was very good. thanks !

    Reply
  43. Esteban Zerega says:
    Dec 1, 2016 at 12:25 pm

    great contribution master! thank you so much!

    Reply
  44. Venkat says:
    Nov 28, 2016 at 4:46 am

    It’s Awesome bro..you saved my time. Its working fine for me

    Reply
  45. Tamara says:
    Nov 2, 2016 at 11:18 pm

    I have followed the steps exactly and still can’t log in. Is there anything else I can do?

    Reply
  46. Csbr says:
    Oct 23, 2016 at 7:29 am

    The layout has changed a lot since this was posted- the admin tab or the browse tabs are nowhere to be seen..

    Reply
  47. Charles Kinga says:
    Oct 17, 2016 at 3:53 am

    Lot of thanx guys. It has worked for me and was stranded on my website security but now am fine.
    The procedures are very user friendly hence easy to understand.
    God bless

    Reply
  48. Camille says:
    Oct 12, 2016 at 4:51 am

    I did all those steps but I still cannot login into my wordpress wp-admin. Can you help me? Thanks.

    Reply
  49. John Osmond says:
    Sep 26, 2016 at 2:23 pm

    Why not use the md5 hash that is already there in phpMyAdmin? Just open the drop-down in the functions column. I will md5 hash your plain text password for you.

    Reply
  50. Sara Moreira says:
    Sep 15, 2016 at 10:50 am

    genuine <3
    thank you for all the know-how and tricks you share!

    Reply
    • WPBeginner Support says:
      Sep 16, 2016 at 11:48 am

      Thanks Sara :) we are glad you find them useful. Don’t forget to follow us on Facebook for more WordPress tips and tutorials.

      Reply
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