How to import/export MySQL database with exact character set on my Dedicated server?

Exporting your database with the correct charset is important in order to avoid problems with data that has non-English characters.

This can be done via SSH by following our examples below. More information on how to connect via SSH to your Dedicated server can be found in this article.

• Export the database

For example, if the character set of your data is Unicode (UTF8) you can use the following command to export it using this charset:

mysqldump -uUSERNAME -pPASSWORD --default-character-set=utf8 USER_DATABASE > backup.sql

Replace USERNAME, PASSWORD and USER_DATABASE with the appropriate values for your database and you will have a file named "backup.sql" properly encoded in UTF-8.

• Import your backup

When you import backup into an empty MySQL database, you can set the exact character set for the data that will be inserted. To do this, use the following command:

mysql -uUSERNAME -pPASSWORD --default-character-set=utf8 USER_DATABASE < backup.sql

Replace --default-character-set=utf8 with the charset used for the creation of the backup.sql file. This will ensure that your data is inserted correctly.