INNOCHECKSUM(1)

NAME
innochecksum - offline InnoDB file checksum utility

SYNOPSIS

innochecksum [options] file_name

DESCRIPTION

innochecksum prints checksums for InnoDB files. This tool reads an InnoDB tablespace file, calculates the checksum for each page, compares the calculated checksum to the stored checksum, and reports mismatches, which indicate damaged pages. It was originally developed to speed up verifying the integrity of tablespace files after power outages but can also be used after file copies. Because checksum mismatches cause InnoDB to deliberately shut down a running server, it may be preferable to use this tool rather than waiting for an in-production server to encounter the damaged pages.

innochecksum cannot be used on tablespace files that the server already has open. For such files, you should use CHECK TABLE to check tables within the tablespace. Attempting to run innochecksum on a tablespace that the server already has open results in an Unable to lock file error.

If checksum mismatches are found, restore the tablespace from backup or start the server and attempt to use mysqldump to make a backup of the tables within the tablespace.

Invoke innochecksum like this:

    innochecksum [options] file_name

innochecksum Options

innochecksum supports the following options. For options that refer to page numbers, the numbers are zero-based.

    • --help, -?
    Command-Line Format | --help
    Type | Boolean
    Default Value | false

    Displays command line help. Example usage:

        innochecksum --help

    • --info, -I
    Command-Line Format | --info
    Type | Boolean
    Default Value | false

    Synonym for --help. Displays command line help. Example usage:

        innochecksum --info

    • --version, -V
    Command-Line Format | --version
    Type | Boolean
    Default Value | false

    Displays version information. Example usage:

        innochecksum --version

    • --verbose, -v
    Command-Line Format | --verbose
    Type | Boolean
    Default Value | false

    Verbose mode; prints a progress indicator to the log file every five seconds. In order for the progress indicator to be printed, the log file must be specified using the --log option. To turn on verbose mode, run:

        innochecksum --verbose

    To turn off verbose mode, run:

        innochecksum --verbose=FALSE

    The --verbose option and --log option can be specified at the same time. For example:

        innochecksum --verbose --log=/var/lib/mysql/test/logtest.txt

    To locate the progress indicator information in the log file, you can perform the following search:

        cat ./logtest.txt | grep -i "okay"

    The progress indicator information in the log file appears similar to the following:

        page 1663 okay: 2.863% done
        page 8447 okay: 14.537% done
        page 13695 okay: 23.568% done
        page 18815 okay: 32.379% done
        page 23039 okay: 39.648% done
        page 28351 okay: 48.789% done
        page 33023 okay: 56.828% done
        page 37951 okay: 65.308% done
        page 44095 okay: 75.881% done
        page 49407 okay: 85.022% done
        page 54463 okay: 93.722% done
        ...

    • --count, -c
    Command-Line Format | --count
    Type | Base name
    Default Value | true

    Print a count of the number of pages in the file and exit. Example usage:

        innochecksum --count ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    • --start-page=num, -s num
    Command-Line Format | --start-page=#
    Type | Numeric
    Default Value | 0

    Start at this page number. Example usage:

        innochecksum --start-page=600 ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    or:

        innochecksum -s 600 ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    • --end-page=num, -e num
    Command-Line Format | --end-page=#
    Type | Numeric
    Default Value | 0
    Minimum Value | 0
    Maximum Value | 18446744073709551615

    End at this page number. Example usage:

        innochecksum --end-page=700 ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    or:

        innochecksum --p 700 ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    • --page=num, -p num
    Command-Line Format | --page=#
    Type | Integer
    Default Value | 0

    Check only this page number. Example usage:

        innochecksum --page=701 ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    • --strict-check, -C
    Command-Line Format | --strict-check=algorithm
    Type | Enumeration
    Default Value | crc32
    Valid Values | innodb crc32 none

    Specify a strict checksum algorithm. Options include innodb, crc32, and none.

    In this example, the innodb checksum algorithm is specified:

        innochecksum --strict-check=innodb ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    In this example, the crc32 checksum algorithm is specified:

        innochecksum -C crc32 ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    The following conditions apply:

        • If you do not specify the --strict-check option, innochecksum validates against innodb, crc32 and none.

        • If you specify the none option, only checksums generated by none are allowed.

        • If you specify the innodb option, only checksums generated by innodb are allowed.

        • If you specify the crc32 option, only checksums generated by crc32 are allowed.

    • --no-check, -n
    Command-Line Format | --no-check
    Type | Boolean
    Default Value | false

    Ignore the checksum verification when rewriting a checksum. This option may only be used with the innochecksum --write option. If the --write option is not specified, innochecksum terminates.

    In this example, an innodb checksum is rewritten to replace an invalid checksum:

        innochecksum --no-check --write innodb ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    • --allow-mismatches, -a
    Command-Line Format | --allow-mismatches=#
    Type | Integer
    Default Value | 0
    Minimum Value | 0
    Maximum Value | 18446744073709551615

    The maximum number of checksum mismatches allowed before innochecksum terminates. The default setting is 0. If --allow-mismatches=N, where N>=0, N mismatches are permitted and innochecksum terminates at N+1. When --allow-mismatches is set to 0, innochecksum terminates on the first checksum mismatch.

    In this example, an existing innodb checksum is rewritten to set --allow-mismatches to 1.

        innochecksum --allow-mismatches=1 --write innodb ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    With --allow-mismatches set to 1, if there is a mismatch at page 600 and another at page 700 on a file with 1000 pages, the checksum is updated for pages 0-599 and 601-699. Because --allow-mismatches is set to 1, the checksum tolerates the first mismatch and terminates on the second mismatch, leaving page 600 and pages 700-999 unchanged.

    • --write=name, -w num
    Command-Line Format | --write=algorithm
    Type | Enumeration
    Default Value | crc32
    Valid Values | innodb crc32 none

    Rewrite a checksum. When rewriting an invalid checksum, the --no-check option must be used together with the --write option. The --no-check option tells innochecksum to ignore verification of the invalid checksum. You do not have to specify the --no-check option if the current checksum is valid.

    An algorithm must be specified when using the --write option. Possible values for the --write option are:

        • innodb: A checksum calculated in software, using the original algorithm from InnoDB.

        • crc32: A checksum calculated using the crc32 algorithm, possibly done with a hardware assist.

        • none: A constant number.

    The --write option rewrites entire pages to disk. If the new checksum is identical to the existing checksum, the new checksum is not written to disk in order to minimize I/O.

    innochecksum obtains an exclusive lock when the --write option is used.

    In this example, a crc32 checksum is written for tab1.ibd:

        innochecksum -w crc32 ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    In this example, a crc32 checksum is rewritten to replace an invalid crc32 checksum:

        innochecksum --no-check --write crc32 ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    • --page-type-summary, -S
    Command-Line Format | --page-type-summary
    Type | Boolean
    Default Value | false

    Display a count of each page type in a tablespace. Example usage:

        innochecksum --page-type-summary ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    Sample output for --page-type-summary:

        File::../data/test/tab1.ibd
        ================PAGE TYPE SUMMARY==============
        #PAGE_COUNT PAGE_TYPE
        ===============================================
               2        Index page
               0        Undo log page
               1        Inode page
               0        Insert buffer free list page
               2        Freshly allocated page
               1        Insert buffer bitmap
               0        System page
               0        Transaction system page
               1        File Space Header
               0        Extent descriptor page
               0        BLOB page
               0        Compressed BLOB page
               0        Other type of page
        ===============================================
        Additional information:
        Undo page type: 0 insert, 0 update, 0 other
        Undo page state: 0 active, 0 cached, 0 to_free, 0 to_purge, 0 prepared, 0 other

    • --page-type-dump, -D
    Command-Line Format | --page-type-dump=name
    Type | String
    Default Value | [none]

    Dump the page type information for each page in a tablespace to stderr or stdout. Example usage:

        innochecksum --page-type-dump=/tmp/a.txt ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    • --log, -l
    Command-Line Format | --log=path
    Type | File name
    Default Value | [none]

    Log output for the innochecksum tool. A log file name must be provided. Log output contains checksum values for each tablespace page. For uncompressed tables, LSN values are also provided. The --log replaces the --debug option, which was available in earlier releases. Example usage:

        innochecksum --log=/tmp/log.txt ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    or:

        innochecksum -l /tmp/log.txt ../data/test/tab1.ibd

    • - option. Specify the - option to read from standard input. If the - option is missing when “read from standard in” is expected, innochecksum prints innochecksum usage information indicating that the “-” option was omitted. Example usages:

        cat t1.ibd | innochecksum -

    In this example, innochecksum writes the crc32 checksum algorithm to a.ibd without changing the original t1.ibd file.

        cat t1.ibd | innochecksum --write=crc32 - > a.ibd
Running innochecksum on Multiple User-defined Tablespace Files

The following examples demonstrate how to run innochecksum on multiple user-defined tablespace files (.ibd files).

Run innochecksum for all tablespace (.ibd) files in the “test” database:

    innochecksum ./data/test/*.ibd

Run innochecksum for all tablespace files (.ibd files) that have a file name starting with “t”:

    innochecksum ./data/test/t*.ibd

Run innochecksum for all tablespace files (.ibd files) in the data directory:

    innochecksum ./data/*/*.ibd

    Note

    Running innochecksum on multiple user-defined tablespace files is not supported on Windows operating systems, as Windows shells such as cmd.exe do not support glob pattern expansion. On Windows systems, innochecksum must be run separately for each user-defined tablespace file. For example:

        innochecksum.exe t1.ibd
        innochecksum.exe t2.ibd
        innochecksum.exe t3.ibd

Running innochecksum on Multiple System Tablespace Files

By default, there is only one InnoDB system tablespace file (ibdata1) but multiple files for the system tablespace can be defined using the innodb_data_file_path option. In the following example, three files for the system tablespace are defined using the innodb_data_file_path option: ibdata1, ibdata2, and ibdata3.

    ./bin/mysqld --no-defaults --innodb-data-file-path="ibdata1:10M;ibdata2:10M;ibdata3:10M:autoextend"

The three files (ibdata1, ibdata2, and ibdata3) form one logical system tablespace. To run innochecksum on multiple files that form one logical system tablespace, innochecksum requires the - option to read tablespace files in from standard input, which is equivalent to concatenating multiple files to create one single file. For the example provided above, the following innochecksum command would be used:

    cat ibdata* | innochecksum -

Refer to the innochecksum options information for more information about the “-” option.

    Note

    Running innochecksum on multiple files in the same tablespace is not supported on Windows operating systems, as Windows shells such as cmd.exe do not support glob pattern expansion. On Windows systems, innochecksum must be run separately for each system tablespace file. For example:

        innochecksum.exe ibdata1
        innochecksum.exe ibdata2
        innochecksum.exe ibdata3

COPYRIGHT

Copyright © 1997, 2026, Oracle and/or its affiliates.

This documentation is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it only under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; version 2 of the License.

This documentation is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with the program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301 USA or see http://www.gnu.org/licenses/.

SEE ALSO
For more information, please refer to the MySQL Reference Manual, which may already be installed locally and which is also available online at http://dev.mysql.com/doc/.

AUTHOR
Oracle Corporation (http://dev.mysql.com/).