How to Install MariaDB 10.4 on CentOS 8 & RHEL 8

MariaDB 10.4 stable version has been released. It is an enhanced, drop-in replacement for MySQL. MariaDB can be an better choice for choice for database professionals looking for a robust, scalable, and reliable SQL server. MariaDB has a number of updated features over MySQL. Use below links to read features comparison between MariaDB and MySQL. This article will help you to install MariaDB 10.4 in CentOS 8 and RHEL 8 systems.

Step 1 – Add MariaDB Yum Repository

First add MariaDB yum repository in our system. Create a new repo file /etc/yum.repos.d/mariadb.repo in your system and add below code as per your operating system and architecture.

sudo vi /etc/yum.repos.d/mariadb.repo

[mariadb]
name = MariaDB
baseurl = http://yum.mariadb.org/10.4/rhel8-amd64
gpgkey=https://yum.mariadb.org/RPM-GPG-KEY-MariaDB
gpgcheck=1

Step 2 – Install MariaDB on CentOS 8

Let’s use the following command to install MariaDB 10.4 in your system. This will also install other dependencies automatically.

sudo dnf makecache
sudo dnf install MariaDB-server MariaDB-client --disablerepo=AppStream

After installing MariaDB in your system start it’s service using the following command.

sudo systemctl start mysql.service

Step 3 – Secure MariaDB Install

You also need to secure your MariaDB installation using passwords and do some other changes. To do this run secure installation script from command line.

sudo /usr/bin/mysql_secure_installation

The secure installation script will ask for user input as some points, follow the installation as per below output showing, All user inputs are highlighted with red color.

NOTE: RUNNING ALL PARTS OF THIS SCRIPT IS RECOMMENDED FOR ALL MariaDB
      SERVERS IN PRODUCTION USE!  PLEASE READ EACH STEP CAREFULLY!

Enter current password for root (enter for none):
OK, successfully used password, moving on...

Set root password? [Y/n] y
New password:
Re-enter new password:
Password updated successfully!
Reloading privilege tables..
 ... Success!

Remove anonymous users? [Y/n] y
 ... Success!

Disallow root login remotely? [Y/n] y
 ... Success!

Remove test database and access to it? [Y/n] y
 - Dropping test database...
 ... Success!
 - Removing privileges on test database...
 ... Success!

Reload privilege tables now? [Y/n] y
 ... Success!

Cleaning up...
Thanks for using MariaDB!

Step 4 – Working with MariaDB

After installing and completing the configuration, connect to a MariaDB server using the following command.

sudo mysql -u root -p

Also try to create a new database, user and assign privileges to a database.

You may also required install phpMyAdmin to manage MariaDB using web interface, which provides easy way to work.