Walkthrough · Intermediate · 20 minutes to learn
How to Use phpMyAdmin
How to read, export and carefully change your database through the panel's built-in window, without the guessing — the steps in order, the snag ahead of time, and the tip our support team repeats daily.
The short answer
One line covers it: read, export and carefully change your database through the panel's built-in window — a intermediate-level job of roughly 20 minutes to learn.
Below are the precise steps, the classic stumble, and one tip from the support desk. Wherever the platform already does a step for you, the guide says so rather than handing you a machine's chores.
By the Hosting & Domains team · Reviewed 18 August 2026
Intermediate
Skill rating
Quick
Time budget
5
Steps in total
24/7
Support on call
No prior knowledge assumed — a hosting account, a browser and 20 minutes to learn of attention is the whole entry requirement. Every instruction runs on our platform exactly as printed, and carries over to any standard cPanel host.
A promise before step one: nothing here is a one-way door. Any step with teeth is flagged, and the way back is printed beside it.
How the work divides up
Over the whole job, you will read first, edit later, export before every session of changes, edit single rows with the pencil icon, treat the sql tab with respect and restore through the import tab.
No part of this needs code or a terminal unless the guide says so plainly — and where it does, the exact commands are printed. The step-by-step is below, with the surrounding sections supplying the context that makes it hold.
Where it comes off, and how to stay on
Running UPDATE or DELETE without a WHERE clause. It executes instantly across every row, and whether that costs five seconds or a whole evening comes down to whether the export exists.
It earns a section of its own because it is no obscure edge case — it is the single commonest reason this task reaches a support queue. Knowing it in advance turns the whole job from risky into routine.
The support desk's own short cut
WordPress stores serialised values that a crude find-replace will wreck. For URL swaps, use WP-CLI's search-replace instead, and keep phpMyAdmin for reading and small precise edits.
A minute spent now repays itself every time this job comes round again — and like almost every hosting job, come round it will.
The steps already done before you arrive
Some steps in this guide exist only because hosting traditionally forced them on you. Here the SSL issues itself, the copy is taken daily without being asked, and one-click installers remove the manual setup. What is left is the part that was always genuinely yours.
Should a step still misfire, support answers at any hour with an actual fix rather than a knowledge-base link and a shrug. Half the guides on this site began as repeat patterns in our ticket queue.
A quick platform makes for a short guide
Every walkthrough in this library is run on the platform we actually operate — cPanel, LiteSpeed, NVMe, one-click installs — so the instructions match your screen rather than gesturing at it from a distance.
The rate you register at is the rate you renew at, so year two costs precisely what year one did — nothing lying in wait on the invoice.
- Every step checked exactly as published
- The snag named before it arrives
- The dull steps taken out of your way
- People reachable at any hour you stall
Why Hosting & Domains
Standard on every plan
Jargon never charges you
Every term is defined on the spot or linked to the jargon buster — nothing assumes prior knowledge.
5 steps, nothing padded
Each stage is a few minutes of steady clicking, and the fiddly moments are labelled fiddly.
Every undo written out
Any step that could bite is marked, together with the exact way to wind it back.
Works exactly as printed
Every step is proven on the platform we run — none of the 'your host may vary' hedging.
Honest about how big it is
Read, export and carefully change your database through the panel's built-in window is a intermediate-level job — set aside 20 minutes to learn, with the platform-absorbed steps marked.
Taken from real tickets
These guides came out of the support queue, so every snag flagged is one people genuinely hit.
Quick Start
Order placed to site online
- 1
Read first, edit later
The left column lists databases and tables; Browse shows rows and Structure shows columns. Looking costs nothing, changes nothing, and gives you the lie of the land.
- 2
Export before every session of changes
One click on the Export tab produces a full SQL backup in seconds. That habit alone turns any blunder into an undo file already sitting on your machine.
- 3
Edit single rows with the pencil icon
Open Browse, click the pencil, change the fields in a form. For a one-off adjustment, a setting or an email address, it is safer than hand-typed SQL every time.
- 4
Treat the SQL tab with respect
It runs whatever you give it, which makes it excellent for bulk corrections and search-replaces. That power is only acceptable because of the export taken a step earlier.
- 5
Restore through the Import tab
Import replays a saved SQL file. That is the return leg of an export, and the manual way to move a database from one host to another.
Built In
Fitted to every plan
- Softaculous included for one-click application installs
- The name's first year included when you order annually
- WebP image optimisation built in, at no extra charge
- SSH, Git and Composer on the developer plans
- Free SSL on every plan, reissued before the old one lapses
- A daily copy, with restores you run yourself from the panel
- A renewal figure identical to the one you registered at
- Webmail in the browser plus IMAP, POP and SMTP for any client
- NVMe SSD storage on every tier, not only the dear ones
- 99.9% uptime as the target, watched around the clock
Frequently Asked
The questions that come up most
Is browsing on its own risky?
Not remotely. Viewing rows and table structure changes nothing. Risk only appears when you edit or run SQL, which is exactly why exporting first turns phpMyAdmin from intimidating into merely capable.
Why can I not see my database in phpMyAdmin?
It only shows databases belonging to the current cPanel account. A missing one usually sits under another account or was never created at all. The panel's MySQL Databases page is the definitive inventory.
Can more than one website run on a single plan?
From the Turbo tier upward, yes — several sites, each with its own name, mailboxes and certificate, inside one account. If the extra sites belong to clients rather than to you, look at reseller hosting instead: it keeps each one properly walled off.
What is the refund position if I change my mind?
Shared, business, WordPress and WooCommerce hosting get thirty days, and reseller gets seven. VPS and dedicated servers are built to order the moment payment lands, so they sit outside the guarantee — as do domain registrations, where the registry charges the instant the name is secured. Inside the window one request returns the hosting fee, with no retention script to sit through.
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