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Moving WordPress Website to a New Domain

Moving WordPress Website to a New Domain

There are several ways to move your WordPress website to a new domain. In this article, we are going to showcase two different methods of doing this:

  1. Easy Migration
  2. Manual Migration of WordPress.

Easy Migration of WordPress

First method is going to be through the usage of plugins. You don’t need to have any technical knowledge for it.

Installing plugins on old domain

  • go to Plugins > Add New > search for All-in-One WP Migration plugin and install it
  • click on Activate
  • go to All-in-One WP Migration > Export
  • click the Export to button and choose the File option.
All-in-One WP Migration plugin

This file is now saved on your PC, and we are going to use it later on.

Installing plugins on new domain

  • go to Plugins > Add New > search for All-in-One WP Migration plugin and install it
  • click on Activate
  • go to All-in-One WP Migration > Import
  • click on Import from and choose the file you’ve saved from old domain
Import All-in-One WP Migration plugin

If you experience some issues with maximum upload file size, you will need to install an additional plugin to increase the file size limit. Then, try to import again.

  • go to Plugins > Add New > search for PHP Settings plugin and install it
  • click the Activate button
  • go to Tools > PHP Settings
  • open the Settings tab and search for ‘post_max_size’, select it and click on Copy To Editor
  • now switch to the Editor tab and edit the line to ‘post_max_size = 512M’ (this means that your WordPress will be able to import a file size of at least 512MB).
PHP Settings plugin

Manual Migration of WordPress

The second method requires knowledge of FTP, Databases and cPanel on your part.

Setup WordPress on new domain

Make sure that you have WordPress installed on your new domain and that the website is working.

Download files from old server

You will need FTP credentials:
HOST: ftp.olddomain.com
Username: [email protected]
Password: ****

Also, you will require an FTP client – we suggest using FileZilla.

Now you need to connect to your hosting server and you can drag & drop your complete website and save it on your local PC.

Moving Website to a New Domain

Upload files to a new server

Once again, you will require new server FTP credentials and an FTP client.

HOST: ftp.newdomain.com
Username: [email protected]
Password: ****

Copy the saved files from the step above to your new server.

Note: do not transfer old wp-config.php and .htaccess files.

Migration

Backup Database

You need to access phpMyAdmin page. The location of this page depends on your hosting. Sometimes it can be accessed through cPanel, sometimes from the Account Manager page.

Once you are on phpMyAdmin page, click on the database you want to export on the left, then go to Export. Choose Export Method: Custom and select all.

Backup Database

Also, navigate to Object creation options and check all the options:

Object creation

Scroll all the way down and click on Go button. This will create the database. Make sure to save it somewhere on your local PC.

Import Database

Once you access phpMyAdmin page, the location of which depends on your hosting, click on the database on the left that you want to export, and then select Import. Then, choose your file and click Go.

Import Database

Changing links in Database

Now that the Database is imported, there are still some leftover options from the old website. We need to change these.

Navigate to the phpMyAdmin page, click on the database you want to edit on the left and go to wp_options table.

Update siteurl and home fields to represent your new domain.

Changing links in Database

Checking if WordPress works properly on new domain

Whether you’ve installed WordPress the easy way or you’ve done so manually, you need to browse through your website and check if the menu links are working correctly and if the images are showing up. This is necessary because sometimes the permalinks and image links do not get updated correctly.

If your menu links are not working after moving your WordPress website to a new domain, you need to go to Settings > Permalinks, and then click on Save Changes.

Moving WordPress Website to a New Domain 1

In case the images aren’t showing up, you need to:

We hope this article was helpful. If you liked it, feel free to check out some of these articles as well!

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