Im reverting back to US servers for now. As the site has been down too long, but would like to get an idea on how to fix this so we can revert back to EU servers.

That didnt make any difference

You could add --mysql-native-password=ON to the Custom Start Command or environment variables in your Railway MySQL service settings. But i am not sure if it will work.

Also what version of MySQL are you using? 8? 9?

Not entirely sure what its loaded up but looks like 9

MySQL Server 8.4.8-1.el9

Yeah in that version mysql_native_password is no longer supported

A solution would be to downgrade to 8.4 where it's still supported.

Yes I need to change the authentication plugin for my MySQL user from mysql_native_password to caching_sha2_password. - Any ideas?

You can run:

Run this to get the users that are using the old plugin:

SELECT User, Host, plugin FROM mysql.user WHERE plugin = 'mysql_native_password';

Then update the root user to use the caching_sha2_password plugin, i think you can leave the old password:

ALTER USER 'root'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED WITH caching_sha2_password BY 'new_password';

Using caching_sha2_password will require you to use a library compatible with it, like in nodejs you will need to use mysql2 instead of mysql.

How do I run that if I cannot connect to the database?

You don't have access to the database/railway project?

I have access to railway via CLI, but I cannot connect to the database due to ERROR 1524 (HY000): Plugin 'mysql_native_password' is not loaded

You can use railway ssh to connect to the railway service ( database )

https://docs.railway.com/cli/ssh

Great, we are in and solved. Thanks a bunch!

You're welcome!