Introduction
phpMyAdmin is a very popular MySQL management software package. To use it, you'll need to install and configure Apache, PHP, and the PHP mysqli extension. See ApacheMySQLPHP for instructions.
Installing From Package
Install phpMyAdmin from the Universe repository. See InstallingSoftware for detailed instructions on using repositories and package managers. (Note, however, that installation from a package manager often does not work).
From console:
sudo apt-get install phpmyadmin
If you're using Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy) or later select Apache2 from the "Configuring phpmyadmin" dialog box.
To set up under Apache all you need to do is include the following line in /etc/apache2/apache2.conf.
Include /etc/phpmyadmin/apache.conf
If you are using Ubuntu 9.04 (Jaunty), there is no need to modify /etc/apache2/apache2.conf as the package installer already copied the file phpmyadmin.conf into /etc/apache2/conf.d directory. You can also skip the set up step and go directly to http://<hostname>/phpmyadmin and login with the user and password you set up during install.
Once phpMyAdmin is installed point your browser to http://localhost/phpmyadmin to start using it. You should be able to login using any users you've setup in MySQL. If no users have been setup, try root with no password to login.
Should you get a 404 "Not Found" error when you point your browser to the location of phpMyAdmin (such as: http://localhost/phpmyadmin) the issue is likely caused by not checking the 'Apache 2' selection during installation. To redo the installation run the following:
sudo dpkg-reconfigure -plow phpmyadmin
Then select Apache 2 for the webserver you wish to configure.
If this does not work, then you can do the following to include the phpMyAdmin-shipped Apache configuration into Apache:
sudo ln -s /etc/phpmyadmin/apache.conf /etc/apache2/conf.d/phpmyadmin.conf sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 reload
- Since Ubuntu 13.10 (Saucy Salamander), Apache no longer loads configuration files from the /etc/apache2/conf.d directory. Instead, they are placed in the /etc/apache2/conf-available directory which is managed with the a2enconf command. Therefore, if you need to manually include the phpMyAdmin-shipped Apache configuration file, you must run the following:
sudo ln -s /etc/phpmyadmin/apache.conf /etc/apache2/conf-available/phpmyadmin.conf sudo a2enconf phpmyadmin sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 reload
Installing from source
You may install phpmyadmin from source. This method circumvents the package manager and you will need to install updates yourself. This is not recommended for a production web server. Also, you'll need to have Git installed to download the source. You will also need Composer and Yarn (package: yarnpkg) to build the generated files.
Install the source
To install it from source, open the console and cd to the www directory using:
cd /var/www/html
Then download it using git by writing:
git clone https://github.com/phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin.git -b STABLE phpMyAdmin-STABLE
Then cd to phpMyAdmin:
cd phpMyAdmin-STABLE
Build it
Install the composer vendor modules
composer update --no-dev
Install the JS tools and build the source code
yarnpkg install --production # Or yarn install --production
To also have other languages than English you will need to install gettext and run
./scripts/generate-mo
Configure phpMyAdmin
Using the configuration GUI
Navigate to http://localhost/phpMyAdmin-STABLE/setup/ in your browser and follow the instructions. When your configuration file is ready you can click "Download" or copy the generated code. Write it into config.inc.php in the phpMyAdmin-STABLE folder.
Copying the sample config file
Copy config.sample.inc.php to config.inc.php and make the necessary adjustments.
cp config.sample.inc.php config.inc.php
Use phpMyAdmin
Now that the configuration is done, navigate to: http://localhost/phpMyAdmin-STABLE/
Note: This guide has been tested on Ubuntu 6.06 (Dapper), Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy), and Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy). And the source install part has been re-written in 2023 by William Desportes@phpMyAdmin-team following the phpMyAdmin documentation. Tested on Debian 12.