Developing a WordPress site locally is a smart way to speed up the development process. In the past, we showed you how to install WordPress on your Windows computer using WAMP or on Mac using MAMP. Once you’re finished perfecting your website on your own computer, the next step is to move the website live and share your creation with the world. In this article, we will show you how to move WordPress from a local server to a live site, step by step.
For the sake of this article, we will show you how to manually move WordPress from a local server to a live site step by step, so you can learn the process. However, you can make this migration from local server to live site much easier by using one of two plugins: BackupBuddy or Duplicator. You can find out more about that process in our guide to moving WordPress to a new host or server with Duplicator.
Before You Begin
In order for you to migrate your locally developed WordPress site to a live server, you need to have a few things in place. First, we’re assuming that you have a WordPress site running on local server, and you have full access to it.
Next, you’ll need to have a domain name and web hosting. We have a list of the best WordPress hosting providers that you can choose from.
To speed it up, you can use Bluehost. They’re an official WordPress recommended hosting provider, and they are offering our users an exclusive 60% off discount + a free domain.
If you need help setting up your website, follow our step by step guide on how to make a website.
Finally, you’ll also need to have a FTP program and know how to use FTP, so you can upload your content to the live site.
Ready to begin? Let’s get started migrating your WordPress site.
Step 1: Export Local WordPress Database
The first thing you need to do is export your local WordPress database. We’ll be using phpMyAdmin to do that. If you are unfamiliar with it, then you might want to take a look at our guide to WordPress database management using phpMyAdmin.
Simply go to http://localhost/phpmyadmin/ and click on your WordPress database. Next, click on the Export button from the top menu bar.
In the Export Method option, you can choose “Quick” or “Custom”. Custom will provide you with more options to export your database. We recommend choosing Quick, and then click the Go button to download your database.
Step 2: Upload WordPress Files to Live Site
Now we’ll need to move all your site files to your live site.
To get started, go ahead and open your FTP client and connect to your web hosting account.
Once you’re connected to your live site, make sure you upload the files in the right directory. For example if you want the site to be hosted on yoursite.com, then you would want to upload all files in your public_html directory.
Now select your local WordPress files and upload them to your live server.
Step 3: Create MySQL Database on Live Site
While your FTP client is uploading your WordPress files, you can start importing your database to the live server. Most WordPress hosting providers offer cPanel to manage your hosting account, so we’ll show you how to create a database using cPanel.
To get started, you can log in to your cPanel dashboard and click on the MySQL Databases icon which can be found in the databases section.
On the next screen, create a database by entering a name for your database and clicking the Create Database button.
After creating your database, scroll down to the MySQL Users section and create or add an existing user to the database.
After adding the user, cPanel will take you to set MySQL privileges for that user. Simply grant all privileges to the user by making sure every box is checked, and then click the Make Changes button.
Step 4: Import WordPress Database on Live Site
The next step in the process is to import your WordPress database. Go to your cPanel dashboard, scroll down to the databases section and click on phpMyAdmin. This will take you to phpMyAdmin where you want to click on the database you created in Step 3. PhpMyAdmin will show your new database with no tables.
Click on the Import tab in the top menu. On the import page, click on Choose File button and then select the database file you saved in Step 1.
Lastly, press the Go button at the bottom of the page. PhpMyadmin will now import your WordPress database.
Step 5: Change the Site URL
Now you need to change the site URL in your database, so that it will connect with your live WordPress site.
In phpMyAdmin, look for the wp_options table in your database that we just imported in step 4. If you changed your database prefix, then instead of wp_options it might be {prefix}_options.
Click on the Browse button next to wp_options or the link that you see in the sidebar to open the page with a list of fields within the wp_options table. See screenshot below:
Under the field options_name, you need to look for siteurl. Click the Edit Field icon which can be found at the far left at the beginning of the row.
When you click the edit field, an edit field window will appear. In the input box for option_value, you will see the URL of your local install probably something like: http://localhost/test. Carefully insert your new site url in this field, for example: https://www.wpbeginner.com
Save the field by clicking the Go button.
Next, you need to replicate this step for the option name: home. The wp_options page can be a few pages long, so simply find the home tab. Usually it is on the second page which you can navigate to by clicking on the pagination arrows in phpMyAdmin.
Update the home url to be the same as your siteurl.
Step 6: Set Up Your Live Site
Now that we have imported the database, and all of our content should be uploaded, it’s time to configure WordPress. At this time, your site should be showing an Error Establishing Database Connection error. To fix this, connect to your website using an FTP client and edit wp-config.php file. Provide the database name, user and password you created earlier in Step 3. Save the wp-config.php file and upload it back to your server. Visit your website, and it should be live now.
Next, you need to login to your WordPress admin panel and go to Settings » General. Without changing anything, scroll to the bottom and click the Save Changes button. This will ensure that the site URL is corrected anywhere else that it needs to be.
After that go to Settings » Permalink and click Save Changes to ensure that all post links are working fine.
Step 7: Fix Images and Broken Links by Updating Paths
Whenever you are moving a WordPress site from one domain to another, or from local server to a live site, you’ll face broken links and missing images. You can either use the SQL query or use the Velvet Blues WordPress plugin.
For those who want to do it via SQL, here is a simple SQL query that should solve this problem:
UPDATE wp_posts SET post_content = REPLACE(post_content, 'localhost/test/', 'www.yourlivesite.com/');
Simply go to phpMyAdmin, click on your database and then click on SQL from top menu. Write this query, but don’t forget to change it with your own local site and live site URLs.
That’s all! Hopefully now your live site will be up and running smoothly. Be sure to check out your site to make sure that everything is working as expected. If you notice any errors, you can check out our guide to common WordPress errors for help troubleshooting.
If you’re doing this on a regular basis, then we highly recommend that you get BackupBuddy because it will make your life much easier.
If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.
“Click on the Import tab in the top menu. On the import page, click on Choose File button and then select the database file you saved in Step 1.” I cannot locate this file – no idea where to even look.
Hi Mike,
In the first step you would have saved a file to your computer. This is the file you need to import here.
Thank you very much for the information,
I have been doing these wrong in the past.
Fantastic how-to article. I followed it and easily migrated my site from localhost to the live server. Thanks for posting! I’m a newbie at moving a site, so I had to figure out some of the simplest things. One thing I had to discover was how to move the file folders from my computer to the host server using cPanel. After researching this, I discovered to ZIP the entire folder with all of its subfolders into a ZIP file and then upload that one file.
Fix Images and Broken Links by Updating Paths: How to update background images? The method mention in step 7, only work normal image not background images. So how to update images?
Hi Christian,
You’ll have to manually update those.
Hi guys, great tutorial.
But when i try to access my site through the url, it asks me to re-install WordPress (i mean is shows me the wizard of the WordPress when it starts)
Plus, when you say go to the database and create a new user, mySQL doesn’t have an option.
Hello please i followed all the steps but at the end of it all am getting an error message stating Erro In Establishing a database connection message
Hi, how do I proceed if there is no cPanel? Thank you in advance!
Hello! Great article. Just two things that I think would be cool to read on this subject.
1.Are there any tips of workflow in order to avoid the broken links, images etc. that you mention?
2.Also, I’ve read plugin reviews where users claim that some bad plugins will leave “trash code” (unusable code and files) after the uninstall/deletion of the plugin, which eventually makes their website slower. Is that true? If yes how could we, as beginners, detect that “trash code” (essentially the leftovers of plugins that we deleted) and remove it?
In my local website I try many plugins that I don’t intend to use and will end up deleting (like many others do), so I am interested in this.
Thank you in advance.
Hi Jasonas,
1. You can follow the steps above in order they appear to avoid broken links.
2. You can view leftover data in your WordPress database by using phpMyAdmin. However, we don’t recommend beginners to do that unless they are certain that this data is slowing down their website.
Hi,
I have been building my site on the local server, I now want to move it over to a temporary Url on my WordPress which is installed on my hosting package to finish and then once ready it will be pointed to the domain name which currently hosts the old site, I have attempted the above steps but I get as far as step 1 and have no idea where the export file goes?
Sorry if this is a silly question but can’t seem to find it anywhere!
Any help would be much appreciated.
Thanks,
Sally
Hi Sally,
Export file is automatically downloaded to your computer. Check your computer’s Downloads folder or any other folder where your browser usually stores downloaded files.
Hello,
Thanks, sorry can’t find it there at all. I emptied the folder and did it again but nothing appeared in there at all, hence asking the question.
All Safari downloads go into the normal download folder, so don’t know where it could be going. Going to give it a go with Duplicator and see if I get any further!
Thanks,
Sally
I think maybe you can try choose download custom instead of download quick, and then in output field, choose “Save output to a file” > Compression: > gzipped
Depending on your setup, it may not automatically download. It may open up in a new screen and you can then copy/paste it into a file and save yourself. Not sure if this is just a MAMP thing or what but when I migrated over to working on a Mac, this part of the steps changed.
Hi,
Your tutorials are great, thank you!
I have just been following this thread and not sure if what I am doing is wrong but I do Step 1 (Export) but no idea where the file that I am exporting goes?
I am running a local server on my Mac and have got stuck here, am I missing something?
I am trying to get my website from the local server to WordPress running on my hosting package with 123 Reg. This is going onto a temporary URL until I am ready to move onto the domain which has currently got the old website on it.
Any help will be much appreciated.
Many thanks
Sally
Thank you so much.
I have a wordpress website on live server, i want to replace it by another wordpress server that i created on localhost, i want to keep the same host and same domaine name. what should i do please ?
This is very helpful. I want to ask about the next step. What if I continue to develop locally and want to sync changes from time to time ? Do you have a tutorial for that ?
I have an issue where my laptop died with localhost MAMP server. I have been able to extract the all the files from the hard disc but I can’t run a database export.
I have an laptop set up with XAMP.
Any thoughts?
Sunday evening.
The client wants the website.
I have tried Duplicator all day long, no way.
Problems with PHP and DB, just doesn’t work… until I get to your post.
Back to basics man, manually put the live on air.
Thanks for sharing.
Its the simpler idea yet we try to automate things and get less work done sometimes.
Had to share with you my truly akcnowledgment.
Nicely done
Thank you! This guide is perfect. I use it every time I forget how I move wordpress from local to live!
I have recieved a complete WP “filesystem” through an FTP server from a supplier of mine, and I want to creat a new webpage with these files, but with my own domain.
Can I use this “walk-through” for this?
Sorry silly questions, but I have only worked on WP through a cloud solution
Hi Chell,
You will also need the WordPress database not just the files. Once you have both database and WordPress files, then you will be able to upload them to your own domain name and import the database.
Hello. I have finished building my site on a local server and ready to move it to my live server. I am assuming that before I follow your steps, that I would need to install WordPress on my hosting account first. Is that correct? And if so, should I click the box that says “Automatically create a new database for this installation” ? If I do that, I will need to replace that database with the one from my local server, right? Or should I leave that box unchecked since I’m about to migrate a new database to it? Thanks.
Hi Scott,
No, instead of installing WordPress you will be moving one from your local server to the live site. Similarly, you will export your local database and then import it on your live server’s hosting account using phpmyadmin via cpanel.
Hi, after updating my wp-config.php file to reflect the database information, I am now presented with the below when accessing the live site:
Fatal error: Class ‘WP_Widget_Media’ not found in /home/…/wp-includes/widgets/class-wp-widget-media-audio.php on line 17
Dude, you are a life saver. That thing with the SQL query to change the links just saved me. I’ve been trying for 2 days straight to fix the site not displaying properly when accessing it from public ip through my domain name, even if “siteurl” and “home” were correctly configured. Thanks!
Hi Manos,
Glad you found the solution. Don’t forget to join us on Twitter for more WordPress tips and tutorials.
Thank you in advance.
I have to upload the word press website from my local machine to the web server my company owns which sits in the same building as I work. My problem is I am not using any hosting services so I am not sure what to do when it comes to the file manager step for the database transfer. Just to be clear, how would I go if I were to upload the website from my local machine to the private company server without using a web hosting service.
Hello I am going to do this migration, but I have a question. What happened if i have to upload a website to a server but in my localhost this website is a part of multisite? How can I isolate this website from the local WordPress Network and finally upload it to a real web server?
phpMyAdmin – Error
Error during session start; please check your PHP and/or webserver log file and configure your PHP installation properly. Also ensure that cookies are enabled in your browser.
session_start(): open(SESSION_FILE, O_RDWR) failed: No such file or directory (2)
The above is what i get and my site is not working please help.
Hi Olumide,
If the error occurs on your live site, then please contact your hosting provider. If this happens on your local server, then this means your local server set up is not properly configured.
I just followed these steps to move a local site to active and none of my local site transferred over.
Please i am having issues with step 7. i imputed the life site but what will i put for the local site? thanks
Thanks god for this article !
The Step 6 saved my life, it could not be found anywhere on the internet !!!
Kisses from France
Hi WPBEGINNER SUPPORT et al,
Thanks I have found your article helping people out there. I hope I can find your favor to my problem. After having modifies by adding codes in functions.php (live site) i can’t view or access the website anymore, it always shows the message saying:
Notice: ob_end_clean(): failed to delete buffer. No buffer to delete in /home/dh_awey63/website/wp-content/plugins/nextgen-gallery/nggallery.php on line 92
ParseError thrown
syntax error, unexpected ‘ang’ (T_STRING)
I used to searched in google the message error and got some advices to access it thru FTP FileZilla client, but I can’t login successfully I always got an error in: “Response: 530 Login incorrect”. “Error: Critical error: Could not connect to server”. Is there a way i can edit the functions.php file to delete my comments there and put back the site in normal, I just don’t know if the web developer have configured ftp account, that freelance developer left his messy and lousy stuff in his web design and has gone out after he receives the payment. I am really new to this area and don’t know what to do. Please help. Thank you very much.
Hi Marlon,
You can also access your WordPress files using the File Manager in cPanel under your web hosting account dashboard. Once you are connected to your site using file manager, you need to locate your functions.php file and undo the changes you made earlier.
Hi WPBEGINNER SUPPORT,
Thank you for your prompt reply. I sad I really have no idea if the guy who build the site created a cpanel account, I really don’t know the login details if there’s any. That bad guy never replies my messages after he receives the money from us. Please help me what to do if there’s any available options. Please visit the website at rheumacares.ph. Thank you very much.
Hi, I’m with a problem in step 4. After importing my database I get an error message. I don’t now what I did wrong in the process and I don’t know how to fix it. Could you give me some advice? I’m posting the error message below
Thanks
Error
SQL query:
—
— Database: `meusite`
—
— ——————————————————–
—
— Table structure for table `wp_commentmeta`
—
CREATE TABLE `wp_commentmeta` (
`meta_id` bigint(20) UNSIGNED NOT NULL,
`comment_id` bigint(20) UNSIGNED NOT NULL DEFAULT ‘0’,
`meta_key` varchar(255) COLLATE utf8mb4_unicode_520_ci DEFAULT NULL,
`meta_value` longtext COLLATE utf8mb4_unicode_520_ci
) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=utf8mb4 COLLATE=utf8mb4_unicode_520_ci
MySQL said: Documentation
#1050 – Table ‘wp_commentmeta’ already exists
Hi Victor,
The table in your database already exists. If you do not have any content on your live site, then you can simply DROP all tables in your WordPress database and then try to import again.
Thank you for a fantastic article!
I have locally built a wordpress site which I would like to replace a site currently live online.
If I want to upload the local site to a test environment online, am I able to do this without the need to setup a new database? i.e. am i able to share the same database being used by the live site? If so how can I do this?
Cheers, Jon
Fantastically helpful article thankyou! I have been building a wordpress site locally to replace one that is hosted online.
I would like to move the locally hosted one to online in a test environment so that it does not replace the existing site.
You instructions suggest that I need to setup a new SQL database for which I will incur charges. Is there a way that I can upload the test site to the existing database without disturbing the live site? If so how?
Thanks,
Jon
Hi Jon,
It is not recommended, but you can change the table prefix in the wp-config.php file of your test site to something unique. Use the same MySQL database as your live site. Doing so your live website’s database will have tables for different WordPress installs.
Can I use the Cpanel Softaculous installation of WordPress, then simply upload the sql database and the current theme I used? Uploading the entire wordPress files from my laptop to the live site using ftp takes very long since my internet connection is extremely slow, (2 mbps).
Hello Jojo Esposa Jr,
Yes, you can do that.
Hello i followed all the steps ,however when i open login page to wordpress i get this
Internal Server Error
Hi Lyada,
Please see our guide on how to fix internal server error in WordPress.
Hello,
I am confused by step two. When I click on my FTP client account it prompts me to use Cyberduck, but then I am not sure which files to upload or where (how to I make sure it is on public html?). I completed step one, so are those the files that I am supposed to upload? I just don’t see all of those anywhere. Thanks!
Hi Madison,
This tutorial is about moving a WordPress website built on local server (Your computer) to a live website. If you have a local server installed on your computer (programs like Wamp, MAMP, XAMP), then you will find local files on your computer. These are the files you need to upload.
The first step only exports your database. You will need it in Step 4.
In step 6, wpbeginner support said, need to update these lines in wp-config.php file for an answer of comment (In Nov 2, 2017 at 12:34 am). Here are lines.
define(‘WP_HOME’,’http://example.com’);
define(‘WP_SITEURL’,’http://example.com’);
My question is, After which line should i need to updates these lines in wp-config.php file?
Here is wp-config.php file without comments.
<?php
define('DB_NAME', 'db');
define('DB_USER', 'user');
define('DB_PASSWORD', 'pass');
define('DB_HOST', 'localhost');
define('DB_CHARSET', 'utf8');
define('DB_COLLATE', '');
define('AUTH_KEY', 'put your unique phrase here');
define('SECURE_AUTH_KEY', 'put your unique phrase here');
define('LOGGED_IN_KEY', 'put your unique phrase here');
define('NONCE_KEY', 'put your unique phrase here');
define('AUTH_SALT', 'put your unique phrase here');
define('SECURE_AUTH_SALT', 'put your unique phrase here');
define('LOGGED_IN_SALT', 'put your unique phrase here');
define('NONCE_SALT', 'put your unique phrase here');
$table_prefix = 'wp_';
define('WP_DEBUG', false);
if ( !defined('ABSPATH') )
define('ABSPATH', dirname(__FILE__) . '/');
require_once(ABSPATH . 'wp-settings.php');
Hi Christian,
You can add them any where before the comment line that says:
/* That’s all, stop editing! Happy blogging. */
To be more precise, you can add these lines after:
define('WP_DEBUG', false)Hi there.
Would somebody be able to tell me if this ‘how to’ would overwrite an existing established website? I’m guessing it would.
Hi Ian,
Yes, it will overwrite an existing established website.
You are awesome!!! Thank you so much, this was super helpful!
Hi
Thanks for this informative post. I followed all the instructions carefully and when I tried to see if the site was live at step 6, it came up with the same page that it was had originally. It says ‘Index of/’ as the heading and then has 2 options below (with details of date modified etc). The 2 options are cgi-bin which brings up a 403 error and wordpress which goes to a blank page. Any ideas on what I might have done wrong? I’m very new to this so might have got something confused!
Thanks
Thank you very much, this is very useful
Nice and helpful. Thanks
Hi
i am trying to upload my localhost word press site to live.
I am stuck at where it said “error database connection” i edit the wp-config file and now the only white screen appearing on my web site. I am confused what to do next? “Next, you need to login to your WordPress admin panel and go to Settings » General. be.” I have to install word press at my hosting to perform this step. Please guide.
Hi,
Many thanks for the instruction. I would like to ask is it possible that I just copy the exported database and upload to the FTP site?
Then I can keep the local host for the future upgrade and testing?
If yes, in future which file I should upload to the ftp and make it live??
Many thanks.
Hi, I wonder if you can help. I’ve got all the way to editing the config file and uploading
i would now appear to be at a sticking point – any ideas on the below? Everything has gone fine to this point. I’ve amended the name, user and password as advised. Would really appreciate any pointers. Thanks
Server Error in ‘/’ Application.
Runtime Error
Description: An application error occurred on the server. The current custom error settings for this application prevent the details of the application error from being viewed remotely (for security reasons). It could, however, be viewed by browsers running on the local server machine.
Hi There. I just want to thank you for such an informative site you are running. I feel like you guys literally held my hand the whole way through, and every glitch I had, you had an article about how to fix it.
I’m happy to say my site is now up and running, while I still have to do a few finishing touches though. Just a great big thank you, I could not have done it without following your website step by step.
I am having issues with step 6, mainly the part where it says “Next, you need to login to your WordPress admin panel and go to Settings » General. Without changing anything, scroll to the bottom and click the Save Changes button. This will ensure that the site URL is corrected anywhere else that it needs to be.
After that go to Settings » Permalink and click Save Changes to ensure that all post links are working fine”. I cannot go into the settings because I cannot login, I have gotten to the login page but it won’t let me login and I cannot create an account because the link is not connected. How would I get around this problem.
Hi Nick,
You can update the URLs in wp-config.php file as well. Connect to your live website using an FTP client and then add these two lines:
define('WP_HOME','http://example.com'); define('WP_SITEURL','http://example.com');Don’t forget to replace example.com with your own URL.
Thank you very much its was very helpful, I was moving WP files from one server to another.
But I cannot compete the 6th step latter part, I can type the Admin username and password, so the site shows I am logged in as the admin from right hand side corner up, but I cannot access the admin panel
I get the error message : “Sorry, you are not allowed to access this page.”
Hello,
I took ages to set up my website locally, and now I am ready to move it to a live site. However, when I go to I get an error message:
#1045 – Access denied for user ‘xxx'(my username)@’localhost’ (using password: YES)
I’m pretty sure my username and password are correct and yet I cannot log in or change my password.
Please help – I’m afraid that I invested so much time into setting up WP and now I cannot move it to a live site because of this issue.
Hi Judit,
You will need to edit the phpmyadmin’s configuration file:
c:\wamp\apps\phpmyadmin4.1.14\phpmyadmin.conf
Try root for username and leave password field blank. Set ‘AllowNoPassword’ to true. Save your changes and restart WAMPSERVER
Hi. I moved my site from my local host wamp to my hosting service.
I did all the steps 1-7 but am facing the following problems:
(I had deleted all my plugins to ensure no conflicts)
– when I login as admin, it shows me the login page instead of the homepage and the admin dashboard.
– header menu bar tabs are working OK except for the HOME tab. When I click on HOME it takes me to localhost. Other tabs take me to the right pages.
– Top bar menu tabs (Favorites, Notifications, Logout) are not working. When I click on Favorites it shows: domainname/login/?redirect_to=http%3A%2F%2domainname%2Fdashboard%2Fprojects%2F#favorites and still shows the login page.
– when I click on logout, it shows domainname/login/domainname/wp-login.php?action=logout&_wpnonce=942fbc8980
– when click on > domainname>dashboard it goes to : domainname/login/?redirect_to=http%3A%2F%2Fdomainname%2Fwp-admin%2F and still shows login page
1. What are the problems with the setup? How do I fix them?
2. Should I delete all the WP files and DB on the live server and try again?
Please help.
Thanks.
TH
Hi,
You may want to follow the steps in our WordPress troubleshooting guide. It will help you figure out what’s causing the issue and how to fix it.
Hi,
I followed these directions, they were great. Thank you. My problem is that I still have an error establishing database. I realize it’s probably because the old website is still on the public_html files as well. Is it ok to delete them?
Hi Tara,
Make sure you download the files as backup on your computer before deleting them.
Kindly revert soon.
i followed all the steps mentioned above. the website is blank. and i cant even log in my wordpress website i created offline. after doing all the steps when i try to see if the site is live. i get PAGE NOT FOUND & the page contains the home page without bimage & captions. Please tell me what am i suppose to do?
I Get the “Forbidden: PHP engine is disable” error after completing this steps, I recon i’ve done something wrong. Anyone has an idea of where the fault can be located?