Why is Adminer better than phpMyAdmin?

phpMyAdmin is the tool that hosting companies usually preinstall for managing MySQL and it does its job. Adminer takes a different approach: a single file you upload, support for seven database systems, and forms that do not ask for more than they need. This page lists the differences which are still true today, and also the places where phpMyAdmin is the better pick.

What you install

Feature	Adminer 6.0.0	phpMyAdmin 6.0.0-dev	Comment
Distribution	one file, 503 kB	4891 files, 77 MB	You upload a single PHP file and open it. phpMyAdmin is an archive which has to be extracted.
Database systems	MySQL, MariaDB, PostgreSQL, CockroachDB, SQLite, MS SQL, Oracle	MySQL, MariaDB	Adminer adds Elasticsearch, ClickHouse, Firebird, MongoDB, Redis, SimpleDB, IGDB and IMAP through plugins.
Required PHP extensions	mysqli or pdo_mysql	mysqli, sodium	Sodium is often not enabled and phpMyAdmin then refuses to start. It also insists on mysqli, while Adminer connects through pdo_mysql just as well.
Customization	47 bundled plugins	configuration file and extra tables	Adminer loads plugins from the adminer-plugins/ directory. phpMyAdmin is configured in config.inc.php and some of its features need their own tables in the database.
Designs	one CSS file	a directory of files	An Adminer design is a single adminer.css. A phpMyAdmin theme is a directory of 285 files in the case of the default one - see their instructions. Both tools have designs contributed by their users.

Logging in

Both tools can ask for more than a password. Setting it up differs:

• Adminer - scan the QR code, put login-otp.php into adminer-plugins/ and put the secret in one more file. The secret stays in PHP code, where the database password alone does not reach it, and it is one secret shared by everyone using that Adminer. Instructions with the QR code.
• phpMyAdmin - add the pma__userconfig table to some database and name that database in config.inc.php. The QR code then appears in the settings and every user sets up their own. The secret is stored there as plain JSON, so whoever can read the database can generate the codes - which is why phpMyAdmin reads the storage through a separate control user.

Hardware keys work in both through WebAuthn, for different things. In phpMyAdmin the key is a second factor after the password. The Adminer login-passkey plugin lets the passkey hold the passwords themselves - they are encrypted with a key derived through the WebAuthn PRF extension, which is stored nowhere, and logging in without the passkey is refused. Both need HTTPS.

Everyday work

Some things are simply more complicated than they need to be. Each of these can be checked in a minute:

• Creating a table gives you four columns in phpMyAdmin. A fifth one needs the Add column(s) button and a round trip to the server. Starting from the database structure page instead of the New link in the menu, it asks how many columns the table will have before it shows the form at all. Adminer opens the form right away and offers the next column as you fill in the last one.
• Adding columns to an existing table asks in phpMyAdmin for their number and for one position shared by all of them. Adding two columns to two different places means altering the table twice, and every alter table rewrites a large table. In Adminer each column has its own position, so one alter table is enough.
• Changing a value in phpMyAdmin means double-clicking it, which is the gesture browsers use for selecting a word, and it edits one value at a time - clicking anywhere else saves it without asking. Setting the same value on several rows at once does not seem to be possible at all. Adminer turns the whole result into a grid of input fields saved together, and can also apply an operation such as + 10 to every selected row.
• Deleting a row is a link next to every row in phpMyAdmin, easy to hit by accident and to confirm without thinking. Adminer has no such link - you tick the rows and press a button below the table.
• The Back button skips a page. Go from Structure to Browse, select some rows, click Edit and go back - you land on Structure, not on Browse. phpMyAdmin navigates by JavaScript and a form submission leaves no entry in the browser history.
• Tables created by an SQL command do not appear in the menu. The tree on the left is refreshed only when the server asks for it, and CREATE TABLE in the SQL tab does not, so the new table is missing until the tree is reloaded by hand.
• Pasting a dump fails even when it begins with SET foreign_key_checks = 0 unless you untick Enable foreign key checks box under the query - the box wins over the line in your dump.

Security solved in JavaScript

phpMyAdmin protects against clickjacking and against leaking the Referer, which is right. It implements both in JavaScript instead of in HTTP headers, and both are noticeable:

• The page is hidden until the scripts load. Every page arrives with html{display: none} and a script removes that rule once it has run. Until then the window stays empty, then everything appears at once and shifts again as the widgets set themselves up. Adminer sends X-Frame-Options and a Content-Security-Policy header, so there is nothing to hide and nothing to flicker.
• Links to the documentation do not leave phpMyAdmin directly. They go through its own script, which renders a page redirecting by JavaScript. On the error page about a missing PHP extension that link returns the same error page, because the script cannot start without the extension. Adminer links out directly and keeps the Referer to itself with rel="noreferrer" and a Referrer-Policy header.

Page weight

Browsing a table of 20 rows in a database with 25 objects, both tools on the same machine against the same database, as the browser reports it:

Feature	Adminer 6.0.0	phpMyAdmin 6.0.0-dev	Comment
First visit	63 kB, 6 requests	2686 kB, 81 requests	phpMyAdmin loads jQuery, jQuery UI, Bootstrap and CodeMirror. Adminer sends the page, its stylesheet, its script, its syntax highlighter and a logo - nothing from anyone else.
Following pages	7 kB, 1 request	269 kB, 5 requests	Adminer downloads only the page itself, everything else stays in the browser cache. phpMyAdmin fetches four more files and its own page weighs 190 kB.

Part of the difference is that Adminer compresses what it sends by itself, while phpMyAdmin leaves that to the web server - which is not always set up for it, and this one was not. Uncompressed on both sides the two pages are 36 kB and 190 kB. The number of requests does not depend on compression at all.

Where phpMyAdmin is a better choice

• It exports to 16 formats out of the box, including LaTeX. Adminer exports SQL, CSV and TSV, other formats are available as plugins.
• It is already there. Of ten large hosting providers checked in August 2026, none preinstalls Adminer: six offer only phpMyAdmin (DreamHost, GoDaddy, Hostinger, IONOS, OVHcloud, SiteGround), the other four preinstall phpMyAdmin and let you install Adminer from their application installer (Bluehost, Hosting.com, InMotion, Namecheap). Uploading 4891 files and enabling the sodium extension is more than most people take on, so the hosting has to do it for them. Adminer asks for no such favor - one file is enough, which is also why nobody needs to preinstall it.

Compared in August 2026: Adminer 6.0.0 against the phpMyAdmin 6.0.0-dev snapshot from 2026-08-06, both on PHP 8.5 and MySQL 8.0. The current phpMyAdmin release is 5.2.3, this page will be updated once 6.0 is out.