Just today I found quite a long article on how to gain access to your WordPress admin area if you have lost your password. I did some ‘googling’ and quickly found a further 14 articles all on the same topic. I visited a forum I normally frequent and there I also found a link to yet another article on this same topic.
Some of these articles get very technical and go so far as to show you how to work with the encoding to be able to add a new password straight to your database. Unless you are an expert on phpMyAdmin I would not suggest any of these technical ways to solve a fairly simple problem.
If you look at the bottom of the login screen you will find a link to use if you have lost your password. To be able to use this option you need either your WordPress user name or your EMail address. If you know either of these you simply enter it and WordPress will mail you a new password. Once you are back in your admin area you can simply change this password to whatever you wish.
In the event of you having forgotten both your user name and EMail address (cannot really imagine this happening) there is still an easy way out without you having to delve into the encrytion or encoding bits to change the password in the database.
Most folk have access to phpAdmin via their c-panel or something similar. If you do not know how to get into your WordPress database you will have to contact your hosting company for the relevant info or assistance. Once you are in the database (via phpMyAdmin or whatever) all you need to do is find the users table and browse the contents thereof. In this table you will find both your user name and EMail address in plain text.
With this new found information you can now return to your WordPress login screen and request that a new password be sent to you. Keeping things simple is definitely the way to go when working with a database.
Till next time.
Nice post. thanks for the tip.
In first place we as blogger need to keep a note of password and user somewhere.
Thanks for visiting.
I recommend the normal way (lost your password) unless the user is advanced with phpmyadmin that you mention he/she entre the new password after encrytion into the hash format (md5)
It is always better to go for the safest way. Thanks for visiting.
Many bloggers that forget their username and pwd, wouldn’t think of checking their database, via phpMyAdmin to recover their user name and EMail information, so they can request a new from their WordPress login screen.
I think this is a very helpful post, that will help many who have forgotten they login information.
Thanks for your comment. I have forgotten user names often in the past but so far I have always remembered my EMail address. I do suppose it is possible to forget the EMail address if you have multiple addresses.
I use Firefox and the default password management used in firefox so I don’t have to forget about my usernames and my passwords..
But if I ever forget it, I know where to look for some great info!
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Sailor always says; ‘You have to make everything accessible to ALL!’ I suppose this info makes things accessible to those with bad memories.