I need help!!!!!!

After Railway's recent redeploy requirement, my MySQL service was upgraded from 8.0 to 8.4 (my source image was set to mysql:8 which resolved to 8.4).

The problem: MySQL 8.4 disables the mysql_native_password plugin by default, but my existing users were created with that authentication method. Now nothing can connect — not my backend, not remote clients, not even Railway's own Database tab (shows 'You have no tables').

Error: ERROR 1524 (HY000): Plugin 'mysql_native_password' is not loaded

I can't fix this myself because:

• I can't connect to run ALTER USER (same auth error)

• railway connect fails with the same error

• MYSQLD_ARGS variable doesn't apply to DB config (Railway warns about this)

• Downgrading to mysql:8.0 is risky since the data dictionary was already upgraded to 8.4 format

I need Railway to either:

1. Add --mysql-native-password=ON to my MySQL server startup, OR

2. Provide a way to run SQL commands on the server without going through the auth plugin

Project: Qrupones App | Environment: production | Service: MySQL

This is blocking all production traffic. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

I suspect you didn't had a pinned image version of MySql so it upgraded upon redeploy

Can you search the logs of your last working deployment (the one from 10 months ago)

And find the MySql version it was running then?

sure thing! give me 1 min plz

maybe mysql 8.3.0?

and this is from today's redeployment

I thought about pinning to mysql:8.3.0, but the data dictionary was already upgraded to 8.4 format during today's redeploy:

" Data dictionary upgrading from version '80200' to '80300' Server upgrade from '80300' to '80408' completed "

So downgrading would likely break since MySQL doesn't support data dictionary downgrades.

Is there any way we can add --mysql-native-password=ON to the server startup command on my service? That would fix everything without any risk to the data, and maybe I can update the way of how my user can connect

Yeah, downgrading after the data dir was already upgraded isn't really supported afaik.
You can edit the start command in the service settings, set it to mysqld --mysql-native-password=ON

There is already a start command there, just add --mysql-native-password=ON to it

Let me try to do it and deploy it again

ok OMW
fingers crossed!

Seems to be working! I am able to connect from my local computer now…

trying to redeploy de backend again

awesome!

anything else, I should change before leaving this?

Just check if everything is working as it should

And make sure the Mysql version is now pinned

Do you think I should take care of this?

2026-02-11T17:44:54.064138Z 8 [Warning] [MY-013360] [Server] Plugin mysqlnativepassword reported: ''mysqlnativepassword' is deprecated and will be removed in a future release. Please use cachingsha2password instead'

Yes! Even if you use the pinned version, you don't know when you'll need to update, and that can cause problems with this start command argument we added.

All right! I’ll update it
Thanks for the help @Medim

Np, sorry for the trouble!