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Last Reviewed: December 13, 2022

Add Your Database


Now that you've set up your Pantheon Dev environment, you need to import your database by creating a .sql dump file.

The Database import requires a single .sql dump that contains the site's content and configurations.

  1. Create a .sql dump using the mysqldump utility. To reduce the size for a faster transfer, compress the resulting archive with gzip:

    mysqldump -uUSERNAME -pPASSWORD DATABASENAME > ~/db.sql
    gzip ~/db.sql
    • Replace USERNAME with a MySQL user with permissions to access your site's database.

    • Replace PASSWORD with the MySQL user's password. You can also move -p to the end of the command to leave it blank if you want to be prompted for your password. This prevents your MySQL password from being visible on your terminal.

    • Replace DATABASE with the name of your site database within MySQL.

    • ~/db.sql defines the output target to a file named db.sql in your user's home directory. Adjust to match your desired location.

    The resulting file will be named db.sql.gz. You can use the Pantheon Dashboard or a MySQL client to add your site's database.

  2. Navigate to the Site Dashboard and select the Dev environment.

  3. Select Database / Files.

  4. Click Import and add your archive (based on file size):

    If your archive is under 100MB, you can upload the file directly:

    1. Click File in the MySQL database field > Choose File.

    2. Select your local archive file and click Import.

      Import MySQL database from file

    Note: If you recently imported the database and need to re-import, refresh the page and use a new filename for the database file.