MySQL Service Management: Commands to Start, Stop, and Restart

Managing MySQL services—starting, stopping, and restarting—is a common task in daily database administration. This guide explains the standard commands for different Linux distributions and system management methods.

Starting MySQL Service

Depending on your system's initialization method (SysV init or systemd), use the following commands to start MySQL.

For systemd Systems (e.g., CentOS 7+, Ubuntu 16.04+)

sudo systemctl start mysqld
# or
sudo systemctl start mysql

Note: The service name may be mysqld or mysql, depending on your installation package and distribution.

For SysV init Systems (Legacy Systems)

sudo service mysqld start
# or
sudo /etc/init.d/mysqld start

Stopping MySQL Service

For systemd Systems

sudo systemctl stop mysqld
# or
sudo systemctl stop mysql

For SysV init Systems

sudo service mysqld stop
# or
sudo /etc/init.d/mysqld stop

Using mysqladmin (Universal Method)

mysqladmin -u root -p shutdown

This command prompts for the root user's password and then gracefully shuts down the MySQL service.

Restarting MySQL Service

For systemd Systems

sudo systemctl restart mysqld
# or
sudo systemctl restart mysql

For SysV init Systems

sudo service mysqld restart
# or
sudo /etc/init.d/mysqld restart

Checking MySQL Service Status

After performing an operation, it's recommended to check the service status to confirm success.

For systemd Systems

sudo systemctl status mysqld

For SysV init Systems

sudo service mysqld status

Enabling Automatic Startup on Boot

To have MySQL start automatically when the system boots, enable the service.

For systemd Systems

sudo systemctl enable mysqld

For SysV init Systems

sudo chkconfig mysqld on
# or on Debian/Ubuntu
sudo update-rc.d mysql defaults

Note: The script safe_mysqld mentioned in some older documentation is from very old MySQL versions (pre-5.0). Modern versions use mysqld_safe, which is typically managed by the system service; direct use is not recommended. Also, the path /etc/inint.d/ is a typo; the correct path is /etc/init.d/.