3 Ways to Reset Your WordPress Password

phpMyAdmin is a web-based database manager available through most hosting control panels under “Databases.” This method directly overwrites the password field in your WordPress database, bypassing the email system entirely. It’s the fastest option if you have cPanel or Plesk access because it requires no file editing.

1. Log in to your hosting panel (cPanel, Plesk, or similar) and open phpMyAdmin.
2. Select your WordPress database from the left panel. The database name is listed in your wp-config.php file next to DB_NAME.
3. Click the wp_users table.
4. Find your user account row and click Edit.
5. In the user_pass row, open the Function dropdown and select MD5. WordPress stores passwords as hashed values, so selecting MD5 here ensures your plain-text input gets encoded before saving.
   
6. Clear the Value field and type your new password.
   
7. Click Go to save the change.
8. Go to your login page (yourdomain.com/wp-admin) and log in with the new password.
9. Once inside the dashboard, go to Users > Profile and update your password to something stronger using WordPress’s built-in form.

After you log in through the WordPress dashboard, WordPress automatically re-hashes the password using its own more secure algorithm. The MD5 step in phpMyAdmin is just a bridge to get the initial value into a format WordPress recognizes during that first login.

This approach adds a brand-new administrator account using a PHP snippet in your theme’s functions file, with no database access required. You’ll need to reach your theme files via FTP, your host’s File Manager in cPanel, or a plugin like WP File Manager.

Before editing functions.php: If you’re using a child theme, edit the child theme’s functions.php, not the parent theme’s. If you’re not using a child theme, be aware that a theme update could overwrite your file. As an alternative to editing the theme, you can use the free Code Snippets plugin to run this code safely from a database-stored snippet that survives theme updates.

Open your active theme’s functions.php file (found in your theme’s root folder) and paste the following code at the very end:

function add_admin_account(){
  $user = 'temprecovery';
  $pass = 'Recov3r@2026!';
  $email = '[email protected]';
  if ( !username_exists( $user )  && !email_exists( $email ) ) {
    $user_id = wp_create_user( $user, $pass, $email );
    $user = new WP_User( $user_id );
    $user->set_role( 'administrator' );
  } }
add_action('init','add_admin_account');

Replace the username, password, and email with your own values. Save the file, then:

• Visit any page on your site to trigger the function (even just loading the homepage works).
• Go to your login page and log in with the username and password you set above.
• Remove the code from functions.php immediately after logging in. Leaving it in place creates a security vulnerability since the credentials are stored in plain text in a public file. Remove it before doing anything else in the dashboard.
• Once inside, update your original account’s password from the Users screen, then delete the temporary recovery account.

This method also works on local WordPress installations, making it useful for developers locked out of a development environment where email isn’t configured.