Joomla software upgrade provides the advantage of new features, services, and additional protections. However, website users may face a “Joomla error 1146″ while they upgrade to a new Joomla version.

This error may occur due to a missing table in phpMyAdmin or because of a wrong Joomla version module installed.

That’s why we often get requests from our customers to fix “error 1146 in Joomla” as part of our Server Management Services.

Today, we’ll see how our Support Engineers update the Joomla version and fix error 1146.

Reasons for Joomla 1146 error

Joomla is one of the popular content management system. It provide many user friendly features in building  a website. However, certain Joomla upgrade and result in database 1146 errors. It’s time now to see why it happens.

From our experience in managing Joomla websites, there are mainly two reasons to occur this error. They are:

1. Missing tables

Sometimes, while saving the changes made in the Joomla control panel, customers may face the following error.

An error has occurred.
1146 Table `updates` doesn't exist SQL=SELECT DISTINCT update_site_id FROM #__updates WHERE `update_site_id` IN ( SELECT update_site_id FROM #__update_sites WHERE `last_check_timestamp` IS NULL OR `last_check_timestamp` <= '1493997061')

This error occurs when the server does not have the relevant tables in the database. Also, the database can be missing due to improper account migration.

2. Upgrade version mismatch

Similarly, error 1146 occurs when the Joomla version and database version are not compatible with each other. For the proper application upgrade, both versions should be the same. If not, we will get an error message like,

Database Schema 3.x.x does not match CMS version 3.x.x

Or

How we solved errors in Joomla

Till now we saw the reasons for the Joomla database error.

Now, let’s see how our Support Engineers solved this error in Joomla.

1. Recreate database/tables

Recently, one of our customers had an “error 1146 Table ‘xxx.#__updates’ doesn’t exist” with his Joomla sites. This error showed in his new Joomla admin panel after migrating the sites to a new host. Then our Support Engineers found that this problem happened due to improper migration.

So, we had to remigrate the database from the older server to the new server. And, that fixed the issue.

2. Correcting Version mismatch

From our experience in managing servers, we’ve seen customers facing problems with upgrading the Joomla version. Sometimes, it may be due to the mismatch in CMS and database versions.

For instance, one of our customers came up with a Joomla database issue. He got an error while upgrading his site from the older version. The error said.

An error has occurred.
1146 Table 'joom_com.#__fields' doesn't exist SQL=SELECT id, default_value FROM #__fields WHERE type = "integer" AND state = 1 AND language IN ("*", "en-GB")

Immediately, our Support Engineers checked the database version and Joomla version. Both were different and that caused the problem.

We fetched the proper Joomla files for CMS and corrected the database via Joomla admin panel > Extensions->Manage->Database-Fix.

That fixed the problem.

[Getting errors in Joomla? We’ll fix it for you.]

Conclusion

In short, website users may face Joomla error 1146 while they upgrade to a new Joomla version or when they migrate sites to another host. This is because of the missing tables or due to the mismatch in CMS and database versions. Today, we saw how our Support Engineers fixed Joomla error 1146.