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How to import and export a database using cPanel

How to Import or Export a Database using cPanel 

Written By: author image Robert Riley
author image Robert Riley
     Reviewed By: John Turner
reviewer image John Turner
John Turner is the President of Duplicator. He has over 20+ years of business and development experience and his plugins have been downloaded over 25 million times.

You may occasionally need to export a database from or import a database to your web host. The following procedures explain how to achieve each of these using the phpMyAdmin web application.

How to Export a Database using cPanel

The following procedure explains how to export a database using the phpMyAdmin cPanel component:

  1. Login to your host’s cPanel interface or equivalent.
  2. Click on the phpMyAdmin icon.
  3. On left of screen, select database to export.
  4. Click the Export tab.
  5. To export the entire database, select the Quick export method, otherwise click Custom and select the tables you wish to export.
  6. Set Format to SQL ❯ Click Go ❯ Save the file to your local drive

You now have a dump of the database in SQL format that is appropriate for future import.

How to Import Data into a Database using cPanel

The following procedure explains how to import data into a database using the phpMyAdmin cPanel component:

  1. Create a SQL file by either exporting the data as explained above or from a third party source.
  2. If your SQL file is over 2MB in size and is not compressed, compress it using zip.
  3. If you don’t have a database or or just want the existing tables removed see this article for how to create a database or remove tables.
  4. Login to your host’s cPanel interface (or equivalent).
  5. Click phpMyAdmin Icon ❯ Import Tab
  6. Click on the Choose File button and select the compressed SQL file.
  7. Ensure SQL is chosen as the format ❯ Click Go

Your data has now been inserted into the database.

author avatar
Robert Riley

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