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How do I solve a yum update failure problem?

Background

BCM support frequently receives this question. While support for the underlying OS is out of scope, these are some common issues other customers have encountered that can cause yum update failures. 

A Corrupted RPM Database

A corrupt RPM database is the most common cause of yum update failures.

A solution that often works to resolve this issue is to remove existing RPM DB files and rebuild the DB, for example:

# rm /var/lib/rpm/__db.*
rm: remove regular file '/var/lib/rpm/__db.001'? y
rm: remove regular file '/var/lib/rpm/__db.002'? y
rm: remove regular file '/var/lib/rpm/__db.003'? y
rm: remove regular file '/var/lib/rpm/__db.004'? y
# rpm --rebuilddb
# yum clean all

After rebuilding the RPM database, try running yum update again. If that doesn’t solve the issue, filesystem corruption may be a culprit.

Other Issues

If you continue to have issues after trying the steps above, please contact the support organization for your Operating System.

Updated on September 8, 2025

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