When you migrate a WordPress website to a
new hosting provider, it can be a stressful task especially if you are not aware of the steps you must take. So, whether you are a seasoned blogger or a novice website owner you will have to go through this experience and knowledge of how to migrate an existing WordPress site to another host as Indsoft Systems is indeed necessary.
For this you will not have to re-install WordPress through 5 steps:
- Migrating the WordPress files such as plug-ins and themes, application code files, configuration files.
- Migrating the MySQL database
- Configuring custom settings which are in .htaccess files or in php.ini
- Configuring domain settings
- Finally, testing the new website.
1. To migrate the WordPress files, you can simply compress all files in a single zip file which contains the core application files, plug-ins and themes and configuration files. When your account has cPanel, you may use File Manager for this migration. When WordPress is not in the public_html, for instance, addon domain, you must go to the folder or directory which contains the WordPress files. When the hosting account does not have cPanel, you may use command line interface for migrating WordPress files.
2. To migrate WordPress MySQL database you can use cPanel when your account has it. Here, you may use phpMyAdmin for migrating the MySQL database. On your existing site, it is important to have the right name of this WordPress database. To export the database you can log in to the cPanel and click phpMyAdmin. From here, you have to choose the database name and then click on Export to transfer it. To make a new MySQL database for the new site you must log in to the cPanel in the new hosting account and click on MySQL databases on its home screen. Here, you have to type in the name for the new database in the "Create New Database" menu. You must then update the database_user, database_password under wp-config.php.
3. Thirdly, you must configure the custom settings for the WordPress site in either one or both files such as php.ini and .htaccess. Because you have to move the WordPress website as a whole, settings must remain intact and if you need to make changes, you have to review the files.
4. You must configure the domain settings; you must switch the site's DNS records to the new host's servers. When you update the DS records to the new servers you can be certain that users will be able to identify the new site.
5. Finally, you have to test the new WordPress website on the Indsoft Systems account to be confident that it is working fine. You need to ensure that the site appears at the URL which represents the domain name; that posts and pages appear correctly and you are able to log in as administrator.