How to Fix Error Establishing a Database Connection in WordPress

How to Fix Error Establishing a Database Connection in WordPress

The Error Establishing a Database Connection is the most frustrating issue WordPress beginners get to deal with. The error can happen even without changing anything on your website. If you don’t fix the error fast you might end up damaging your online reputation. In this post we will be looking at the steps you need to take to fix this error.

What causes this error?

The error results when WordPress is not able to establish a connection to your database. There are many reasons why this might happen. For starters, you can get the Error Establishing a Database Connection when your database login credentials are wrong or have been changed. When the server is unresponsive or your database has been corrupted can also cause this error. Here is how you can troubleshoot the error.

Does the problem occur for /wp-admin/ as well?

Once the error starts occurring you need to make sure you are getting it for both front-end and back-end of your WordPress website. If the error is the same, you need to move to the next step. However, if the error is not the same on wp-admin, you just need to repair the database.

Check the WP-Config file

The WP-Config.php is the most important file in the entire WordPress installation. This is where you specify details for WordPress to connect to the database. If you changed your user password or root password you have to change this file also. Check if everything in the wp-config.php is the same. Don’t forget to check for typos too. Replacing the localhost with the IP has also been found to work in fixing the error. If everything is fine, then the issue may be server side. You need to check your web host.

Check web host

When your website is swarmed with lots of traffic you may notice this error. This is because the host server is not able to handle the load. As a result your website will become slow and some users will get the Error Establishing a Database Connection. The first thing you need to do now is to get in touch with your hosting provider and check if MySQL server is responsive.

If you want to test the MySQL server on your own, you should check other sites that are using the same sever. Do they have the same issue as you? If you get the same issue then the problem is with the MySQL server. If you don’t have any other site to test with, go to cPanel and try getting to the phpMyAdmin and then connect the database. If you can connect verify that the database user has sufficient permission. If you cannot connect to the database then there is a server issue. Contact your hosting provider.

Error Establishing a Database Connection