Connect one LAMP app to mysql database of another LAMP app

I have 2 droplets, both with a LAMP stack. Both also have PHPMyAdmin installed, run a PHP application, and have a self-signed SSH certificate that auto redirects to https.

What I would like to do is connect to the MySQL database that’s on Droplet 1 from the app on Droplet 2. I know you can do this by running a mysql server Droplet 1, but both need to run a full PHP app in this case.

Here is what I’ve already done and tried:

• Enabled private networking on both droplets (https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-enable-digitalocean-private-networking-on-existing-droplets)
• On Droplet 1 I’ve added port 3306 to the firewall with sudo ufw allow 3306/tcp and sudo service ufw restart
• Both have the same firewall settings applied that are configured in the DO interface. I’ve added ‘All TCP’, ‘All ports’ from source ‘Droplet 2’
• Outbound rules on the firewall settings are ‘ICMP’, ‘All TCP’ and ‘All UDP’ from ‘All ports’ and ‘All IPv4’ and ‘All IPv6’
• I’ve created a MySQL user through PMA on Droplet 1 with hostname %

My PHP app connection settings $db[‘remote_db’] = array( ‘dsn’ => ‘’, ‘hostname’ => ‘PRIVATE IP OF DROPLET HERE’, // in the format xx.xx.xx.xx so not with https:// in front of it ‘port’ => 3306, ‘username’ => ‘user’, ‘password’ => ‘password’, ‘database’ => ‘database’, ‘dbdriver’ => ‘mysqli’, ‘dbprefix’ => ‘’, ‘pconnect’ => FALSE, ‘db_debug’ => FALSE, ‘cache_on’ => FALSE, ‘cachedir’ => ‘’, ‘char_set’ => ‘utf8’, ‘dbcollat’ => ‘utf8_general_ci’, ‘swap_pre’ => ‘’, ‘encrypt’ => FALSE, ‘compress’ => FALSE, ‘stricton’ => FALSE, ‘failover’ => array(), ‘save_queries’ => TRUE );

Currently the app op Droplet 2 can not connect to the database that runs on Droplet 1. What am I missing?

A few questions:

1. Do I need to do anything in the /etc/mysql/my.cnf file with bind-address?
2. When creating the user on Droplet one through PMA, did I use the right settings?
3. Any other setting that I’m missing?