Title: Recovering a wordpress database
Last modified: August 22, 2016

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# Recovering a wordpress database

 *  [mufc19](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mufc19/)
 * (@mufc19)
 * [11 years, 8 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/recovering-a-wordpress-database/)
 * Hi, this is the first time I’m using WP and having a few problems with it.
 * So I was trying to change the registrant of a domain, and was told to backup 
   all my stuff as everything will be erased when the registrants are changed for
   a domain.
 * It was a WordPress site and I didn’t know that I had to backup the WP database
   as well, so I just backed up all the files (not the database files) through [http://FTP.](http://FTP.).
   and changed the registrant.
 * I realise I made a big mistake now, as when pasting all the files through Filezilla,
   it’s not working, because of no database.
 * Now my question is, is there ANY possible way I can get that WP database back?
   I read somewhere that there is a backed up WP database file somewhere in the 
   wp-admin folder, or another folder.
 * However, no method was provided. This is a charity site, and I really don’t want
   to lose everything there, just because of my mistake, can anyone help please??
 * Thanks

Viewing 3 replies - 1 through 3 (of 3 total)

 *  [Matt](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mzak/)
 * (@mzak)
 * [11 years, 8 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/recovering-a-wordpress-database/#post-5332074)
 * Unfortunately there probably isn’t much that can be done at this point. If the
   database is no longer available to you, and there weren’t any database backup
   plugins installed and running scheduled backups, I’m not aware of any way to 
   recover the the database.
 *  Thread Starter [mufc19](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mufc19/)
 * (@mufc19)
 * [11 years, 8 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/recovering-a-wordpress-database/#post-5332109)
 * I’ve noticed that in the files I’ve backed up, if I go htdocs/wp-content/ there
   is a folder called “backupwordpress-34dfae1fe2-backups”. In this folder there
   are a few backup zip files namely “domainname-default-1-complete-2013-10-16-00-
   04-29”, so I’m guessing this might be a 2013 backup.
 * The “backupwordpress-34dfae1fe2-backups” also contains a “domainname-default-
   2-complete-2013-10-31-23-46-41.sql” file. Do you think this sql file has anything
   to do with the database?
 * Thanks
 *  [Matt](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mzak/)
 * (@mzak)
 * [11 years, 8 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/recovering-a-wordpress-database/#post-5332136)
 * Yes, in that case, you’re probably in luck. BackUpWordpress ([https://wordpress.org/plugins/backupwordpress/](https://wordpress.org/plugins/backupwordpress/))
   is a popular backup plugin, and that sql file is very likely your database. You
   should be able to use that to get your site up and running again.

Viewing 3 replies - 1 through 3 (of 3 total)

The topic ‘Recovering a wordpress database’ is closed to new replies.

## Tags

 * [wp-database](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/wp-database/)

 * In: [Fixing WordPress](https://wordpress.org/support/forum/how-to-and-troubleshooting/)
 * 3 replies
 * 2 participants
 * Last reply from: [Matt](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mzak/)
 * Last activity: [11 years, 8 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/recovering-a-wordpress-database/#post-5332136)
 * Status: not resolved

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