Remote connection to a database hosted on Plesk fails: ERROR 2003 (HY000): Can’t connect to MySQL server

Symptoms

• Remote connection to MySQL/MariaDB database hosted on Plesk fails with the error:

  # ERROR 2003 (HY000): Can't connect to MySQL server on '<Plesk server Ip Address>'

• The option Allow local MySQL server to accept external connections is enabled in Plesk > Tools & Settings > Database Servers > click MySQL (MariaDB).

Cause

MySQL/MariaDB misconfiguration. There is another configuration file at /etc/mysql/ folder where the localhost address is set at the bind-address parameter of the MySQL server configuration MySQL service.

Resolution

1. Connect to the server via SSH.

2. Find the config file where bind-address is set to the 127.0.0.1

   # grep -R 'bind-address' /etc/mysql/* /etc/my.cnf
   /etc/mysql/mariadb.conf.d/example.cnf:bind-address = 127.0.0.1

3. Comment or remove the line at the configuration file where the bind-address parameter is set to the localhost address(or remove this line completely), it should look like below:

   # grep bind-address /etc/mysql/mariadb.conf.d/example.cnf
   #bind-address = 127.0.0.1