Convert a MySQL database to UTF-8

mysql.com 5.7

Make sure that you back up the database.

Convert database to UTF-8

ALTER DATABASE your_database_name CHARACTER SET utf8 COLLATE utf8_unicode_ci;

Convert table to UTF-8

ALTER TABLE your_table_name CONVERT TO CHARACTER SET utf8 COLLATE utf8_unicode_ci;

Links:
ALTER DATABASE :mysql.com
ALTER TABLE :mysql.com