How to Move Your Website to a New Host Without Losing Traffic

If you need to move your website to a new host, the main risks are downtime, broken email and lost search traffic. All three are avoidable with a little planning. This checklist walks through the steps in order, whether you do the move yourself or hand it to someone else.

When it makes sense to move

• Your site is slow or goes down too often.
• You cannot reach a real person when something breaks.
• The price has gone up without the service improving.
• You want hosting and maintenance handled by the same team.

Step 1: Take stock before you touch anything

Write down where each piece of your online presence lives. Many problems during a move come from something nobody knew was connected.

• Domain registrar: the company where your domain name is registered.
• DNS: the settings that point your domain to your website and email.
• Email: whether your business email runs through your current host. If it does, it needs its own plan.
• Logins: for the registrar, the current host and the website itself.

Step 2: Make a full backup

Back up both the website files and the database, and keep a copy somewhere other than the current host. This is your safety net if anything goes wrong.

Step 3: Copy the site to the new host and test it

Set the site up on the new host while the old one is still live. Test it there before anyone else sees it: check every page, every form, and any login or payment features. Visitors should notice nothing at this stage.

Step 4: Switch the domain

When the copy works, update the DNS settings so your domain points to the new host. The change can take from a few minutes to a day or so to reach everyone. During that window some visitors see the old host and some see the new one, which is why the old site should stay online.

Step 5: Check the details that protect your traffic

• Keep the same page addresses. If a URL has to change, set up a redirect from the old address to the new one.
• Confirm the SSL certificate is active so the site loads with https.
• Send a test through every form and make sure it arrives.
• Send and receive a test email on your business address.
• Watch Google Search Console for errors over the following weeks.

Step 6: Keep the old host for a short while

Do not cancel the old hosting on the same day. Keep it for a week or two until you are sure everything works, then cancel.

Mistakes to avoid when you move your website to a new host

• Forgetting that email was tied to the old host.
• Changing page addresses without redirects.
• Switching the domain before testing the new copy.
• Cancelling the old host too early.

Have it done for you

We move WordPress websites to our hosting with minimal downtime. We review the existing site, handle the domain and DNS changes, migrate the content and test everything before the switch. See our WordPress hosting and maintenance plans or ask us about moving your site.