How to Delete a MySQL Database on Linux via Command Line

MySQL is the most popular open-source relational database management system.

This tutorial describes how to delete (or drop) a MySQL or MariaDB database through the command line.

Before you begin

All commands are executed as an administrative user (the minimum privilege required to delete a database is DROP) or with a root account.

To access the MySQL console type the following command and enter your MySQL root user password when prompted:

mysql -u root -p

If you haven’t set a password for your MySQL root user you can omit the -p switch.

List All MySQL Databases

Before dropping the database, you may want to view a list of all the databases you’ve created. To do so from within the MySQL shell execute the following command:

mysql> SHOW DATABASES;

The command above will print a list of all databases on the server. The output should be similar to this:

+--------------------+
| Database           |
+--------------------+
| information_schema |
| database_name      |
| mysql              |
| performance_schema |
| test               |
+--------------------+
5 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Delete a Database in MySQL

Deleting a MySQL database is as simple as running a single command. This is a non-reversible action and should be executed with caution. Make sure that you are not removing the wrong database, as once you delete the database it cannot be recovered.

It is always a good idea to create a backup of the database before running the drop query.

To delete a database type the following command, where database_name is the name of the database you want to delete:

DROP DATABASE database_name;

Query OK, 1 row affected (0.00 sec)

If you try to delete a database that doesn’t exist you will see the following error message:

ERROR 1008 (HY000): Can't drop database 'database_name'; database doesn't exist

To avoid seeing errors as above, use the following command instead:

DROP DATABASE IF EXISTS database_name;

Query OK, 1 row affected, 1 warning (0.00 sec)

In the output above, Query OK means that the query was successful, and 1 warning tells us that the database doesn’t exist and no database was deleted.

Note: On Linux, MySQL database and table names are case sensitive.

Delete a MySQL Database with mysqladmin

You can also delete a MySQL database from the Linux terminal by using the mysqladmin utility.

For example, to delete a database named database_name, type the following command and enter your MySQL root user password when prompted:

mysqladmin -u root -p drop database_name

Conclusion

You have learned how to delete a MySQL database.

Feel free to leave a comment if you have any questions.