Debian Allow MySQL root user to login using phpMyAdmin

On Debian/Ubuntu by default MySQL root user can only login from local accounts.

MariaDB [(none)]> select plugin from mysql.user where user='root';
+-------------+
| plugin      |
+-------------+
| unix_socket |
+-------------+
1 row in set (0.00 sec)

MariaDB [(none)]> 

To enable login from phpMyAdmin, you need to set plugin to “mysql_native_password”.

To do this, login to MySQL as user root, then run

update mysql.user set plugin='mysql_native_password' where user='root';