Do you want to move your WordPress site to a new domain? Changing your website’s domain name can significantly impact your SEO rankings, and it’s a process that needs to be done very carefully.
While you cannot avoid temporary SEO fluctuations when moving your website to a new domain, you can definitely minimize the impact and quickly regain your search traffic and rankings.
In this guide, we will show you the proper way to move WordPress to a new domain without losing SEO.
Here’s the 5 step process that we will cover to help you migrate your WordPress site to a new domain name:
- Create a Duplicator package of your WordPress site
- Create a database for new domain name
- Unpack WordPress on new domain
- Setup Permanent 301 redirects
- Notify Google about the change
Before You Start
Before you start, we want to emphasize a few things.
The process of switching to a new domain will temporarily affect your search engine rankings as Google and other search engines adjust to the changes.
Yes, this will also temporarily affect your search traffic as well. Please keep in mind that this is normal, and it happens to all websites that switch to a new domain.
However, you can dramatically decrease the SEO impact by following this guide. We will show you the right way of moving your WordPress site to a new domain name, setting up proper 301 redirects, and notifying search engines.
Please note that this guide is not for moving WordPress site to a new web host. This is for switching a domain name. Yes, while the process is similar, there are extra things involved in this process.
Pre-Steps
In this guide, we are assuming that you have your WordPress site setup on oldsite.com, and you are trying to migrate it to newsite.com.
We are also assuming that you already have a web hosting account, and you are familiar with your web hosting control panel.
You will also need to know how to use FTP.
In case you don’t have a web hosting account, we recommend using Bluehost (great for small sites + comes with a free domain) or WP Engine (great for large sites).
Once you have your new web hosting account and domain name, you’re ready to start the process.
Step 1: Create a Duplicator package of Your WordPress Site
The first thing you need to do is create a full backup of your WordPress site. While there are many WordPress backup plugins available, the one we’re going to show in this step does both backups and migrations.
It’s Duplicator and it’s a completely free plugin.
Let’s start by installing and activating the Duplicator plugin on your old domain name. For more details, see our step by step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Once activated, the plugin will add a Duplicator menu item in your WordPress admin. You need to click on the Duplicator menu, and then click on the create button to create a new package.
After that, you will be asked to click on the Next button to continue.
Duplicator will now run the website duplicator wizard. First, it will run some tests to see if everything is in order. If all items are marked ‘Good’, then click on the ‘Build’ button.
The plugin will now start creating a duplicator package of your WordPress site. This process may take a few minutes depending on the size of your website.
Once finished, you’ll see download options for Installer and the Archive package. You need to click on the ‘One click download’ link to download both files to your computer.
The archive file is a complete copy of your website, and this will allow you to move WordPress to another domain name. The installer script will automate and run the migration by unpacking the archive file.
Step 2. Create a Database for New Domain Name
Before you can move, you’ll need a database to unpack WordPress on your new domain name.
If you have already created a database, then you can skip this step.
To create a database, you need to visit your hosting account’s cPanel dashboard, scroll down to the ‘Databases’ section, and then click on the ‘MySQL Databases’ icon.
On the next screen, you’ll see a field to create a new database. Simply provide a name for your database and click on the ‘Create Database’ button.
cPanel will now create a new database for you. After that, you need to scroll down to the MySQL Users section.
Next, provide a username and password for your new user and click on the ‘Create a user’ button.
The new user you just created, still does not have permission to work on the database. Let’s change that.
Scroll down to the ‘Add User to Database’ section. Simply select the database user you created from the dropdown menu next to the ‘User’ field, then select the database, and click on the add button.
Your database is now ready to be used on for moving WordPress to the new domain name. Make sure to note down the database name, username, and password. You’ll need this information in the next step.
Step 3. Unpacking WordPress on New Domain Name
Now you need to upload the Duplicator files you downloaded earlier to your new domain name.
First, connect to your domain name using an FTP client. Once connected, make sure that the root directory of your website is completely empty.
After that, you can upload the archive and installer files to the root directory.
Once both files have finished uploading, you are now ready to unpack WordPress.
Open a new browser tab and go to the following URL:
http://example.com/installer.php
Don’t forget to replace example.com with your new domain name. This will launch the Duplicator migration wizard.
The installer will look for the archive file. You need to check the terms and conditions checkbox and click on the next button to continue.
Now, the installer will ask you to enter your WordPress database information.
Your host will likely be localhost. After that, you will enter the details of the database you created for your new domain name in the earlier step.
Once done, click on the next button to continue.
Duplicator will now unpack your WordPress database backup from the archive into your new database.
Next, it will ask you to update site URL or Path. You shouldn’t have to change anything since it automatically detects the URL of your new domain name and its path.
If it doesn’t, then you can change the URL to your new domain name. After that, click on the next button to continue.
Duplicator will now finish the migration.
You can click on the ‘Admin Login’ button to enter the WordPress admin area of your website on the new domain name.
Step 4. Setting up Permanent 301 Redirects
Setting up a permanent 301 redirect is very important for both SEO and user experience.
This step will allow you to automatically redirect users and search engines to your new domain name.
In other words, whenever someone lands on one of your old posts or pages, they will be automatically redirected to your site on the new domain.
To setup a permanent 301 redirect, you need to connect to your old site using FTP and edit the .htaccess file.
This will be located in the same directory as your wp-includes or wp-admin folder. Open the .htaccess file and paste the following code at the very top:
#Options +FollowSymLinks RewriteEngine on RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.newsite.com/$1 [R=301,L]
Note: Replace newsite.com with your new domain in the above code.
Once you have applied these changes, then visit your old domain name. It should automatically redirect you to the new domain.
If it doesn’t, then it means the redirection is not setup properly, and your server likely doesn’t support redirect rules. You need to reach your web hosting’s support to get RewriteEngine turned on.
Step 5. Notifying Google About the Change
Now that you have moved WordPress to a new domain name and setup redirects, it is time to notify Google about the change of address. This will help Google find your new domain name quickly and start showing it in search results.
First, you need to add your new domain name to the Google Search Console. See step 1 in our Google Search Console guide for instructions.
After you have added your new site, you need to switch to the old version of Google Search Console.
Next, you need to switch to your old domain name and then click on the gear icon at the top to launch change of address tool.
On the next screen, Google Search Console will show you a step by step wizard to submit your change of address request.
First it will ask you to select your new site from the drop down menu. After that, click on the check button to test 301 redirects and then confirm verification.
Finally, click on the submit button to send your address change request.
Notify Users About the Move to New Domain Name
While the 301 redirects do their job, it is always good to make a public announcement about the migration.
You can do this by simply writing a blog post on your new site and sharing it on your social media accounts.
If you have an email marketing list, then you should send a newsletter to let all your subscribers know.
This can be helpful in a lot of ways.
First and foremost, your users are more likely to remember the new domain once they read about it.
Second, you can ask your users to let you know if they see any bugs. You alone cannot test your site in all different type of browsers and system environments. It’s always helpful to have a fresh pair of eyes looking at it.
We hope that this tutorial helped you move your WordPress site to a new domain name. You may also want to see our guide on how to track your search keyword rankings after moving to a new domain name.
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Thanks for this. What is the difference for migrating to new host (and domain)? Is there any difference in steps and instructions?
You would use the same steps for a new host as well.
I had to put in mine in the public_html folder to work. Very frustrating at first until I tried that!
Thanks for a great tutorial!
I’ve ran into a quirk after following all the steps.
My site redirects everything EXCEPT the content of the home page.
I updated the name servers about two days ago.
I did the redirection via .htaccess.
I’m not sure where to look to troubleshoot the issue. Any direction is appreciated. Thanks again!
We would recommend checking for any caching plugins as well as reaching out to your hosting provider for the most common reasons for that issue and your hosting provider can normally take a look from their end as well.
Following up.
I was/am using W3 Total Cache.
Before I migrated, I forgot to disable caching. And that caused issues.
After the migration, I had to manually remove W3 Total Cache in order to get the new site working again.
There was a section of caching code left over in the new .htaccess file.
All has been good since then!
Glad you were able to get the issue sorted
Hi,
Great tutorial. I have to ask about the SSL redirects since it may cause issues for domains that use cloudflare for instant.
So while adding the code on the .htaccess file in the old website how do I add a newwebsite.com/1$ to that command ?
If you mean how to update your site to a new domain using a CDN like Cloudflare, we would recommend reaching out to the CDN you are using for their current methods for that kind of change.
In the last step you mentioned “notify google about the change”.
But what if don’t notify Google about the change, just move the website to new domain, and remove all the pages from old domain (as my website is new and doesn’t have any organic traffic)?
Is it valid?
You can do that if you want but you would likely take a negative hit in your search engine rankings.
I have a question about subscribers the website who have created profiles. Would I have to do redirects for their individual profile pages ?
If you are using the same systems then you shouldn’t need an additional redirect unless the tool you are using says so.
I have a question, I already set 301 redirection, and all the request to the old site is redirecting, now my question is, when I can delete old site and its content permanenty?
After you create your redirects you can remove the old content.
Hello, please I’m confused on this sentence “Once connected, make sure that the root directory of your website is completely empty.”
How can make the root directory to be empty cause is showing some files and folders. Please I need an answer on how to do that. Thanks
You can either use FTP or some hosts have file managers you can use to delete the folders or you can reach out to your host for assistance
Thanks for this! How would you handle domain1 is moving to domain2, but, many of the URL slugs on domain1 are different on domain2. For example, domain1/this-is-a-post/ will be going to domain2/this-is-the-new-post/
It would depend on the specific changes but depending on how drastic the change you may need to manually set up the individual redirects.
Thank you for this guide. It helped me.
I tried the 301 redirect on htaccess. However it only redirects the homepage. Any chance for help? Thanks
You may want to try clearing your caching and checking with your hosting provider to ensure they don’t see any errors on their end.
This is great if moving a complete old site to a new domain. But what to do to when you are setting up a new site and want to move over only a few posts from the first site? I don’t want to lose organic traffic.
You can check under Tools>Export and select the specific posts you want to transfer to your site.
Thanks a lot for this tuto.
I don’t understand why we have to set up permanent 301 redirects if I keep the same domain name ?
Thank for your answer,
Alex
This article is for moving a site to a new domain name. If you only want to change hosting providers, you would want to take a look at our article below:
https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/how-to-move-wordpress-to-a-new-host-or-server-with-no-downtime/
Sorry, thanks a lot.
You blog posts have always helped me a lot
Glad our guides have been helpful
Hey thanks a lot for this step by step tutorial.I was able to move clients site in just 30 mins. He was surprised. Thanks a lot.
Glad our guide could help
Hello, got a bit of a problem here. I transferred my good php and zip files to the public directory, and yet when I browse to mydomain/installer.php it just doesn’t find the page. What could be the problem?
Thanks in advance
You may want to reach out to your hosting provider to ensure the domain is set up to the correct location that you’re adding the files.
Thanks, Buddy, After reading your article It’s just like the peace of cake
Glad our article could be helpful
GOOD guide.
but if I want to change my URLs in a new domain
my post in the old domain is: oldedoman.com/best-products-2020/
I want to change to newdomain.com/best-products/
How to redirect all my posts
Thanks
For that type of change, you would need to create manual redirects following our guide below:
https://www.wpbeginner.com/beginners-guide/beginners-guide-to-creating-redirects-in-wordpress
Brilliant tutorial. Thank you! Work like a charm!
Glad you found our guide helpful
Does this process work with a bluehost basic account? I have purchased my new domain but can’t assign it as an Addon domain since I can only have 1 website. What is the best way to work with this?
If you’re unable to create an addon domain we would recommend reaching out to your host and some offer support or different ways to set it up.
Does this method work if I am using the Bluehost Basic plan where I can only have one website? I can’t make my new domain an add on domain.
You can move from a host to BlueHost’s basic plan following this guide
Hi,
I have questions that where to use 301 redirect, in new domain .htaccess or old domain .htaccess.
In my case I have changed my website domain as well as web hosting. Then where to apply 301 redirect and how many time I should active my old domain and hosting active?
You would want to add 301 redirects to the old domain. It depends on your old site and personal preference for how long you should keep the old domain active but you shouldn’t need the old hosting.
I earlier had my domain in a WordPress site that I do not own. I developed my website there. Now, I have moved my domain to a new WordPress site that I own and also used the Export/Import option to transfer my content to the new site. However, I am having to re-design my website again. Does the procedure mentioned here ensure that my site is transferred intact?
The method in this guide should let you keep your theme and plugins how they are set up.
Hi, thanks for sharing.
Once I’ve successfully migrated my old website to the new domain, will the 301 redirect continue to redirect even after ive deleted my old website? The reason I’m asking is because I have several posts on facebook that point to my old site.
As long as the redirect remains in your htaccess file it will continue to redirect to your site.
After moving the the old site to new site, do I still need to purchase new SSL certificate or the SSL certificate for old site will work for the new site
Thanks!
Most hosts should offer Let’s Encrypt as a free option but you would need to set up SSL for your new domain.
Perfect! Thank you for a great post!
You’re welcome
OK, I’m tracking with most of this guide, but what particular steps do I need to take if my website is hosted with HostGator, my old domain is registered with GoDaddy, and my new domain is registered with Domain.com? Do I have to link the new domain with HostGator hosting in some way before I can create a new database in Step 2?
You would normally want to point your domain’s nameservers to where the new domain would be hosted to link the domain to your host.
Thanks for these clear steps! I have one question. So I moved everything to the new domain name and have applied the 301 redirect at the old domain. Should I keep the pages and posts on the old domain or simply remove those? Because doesn’t google see those pages as copies now I’ve basically duplicated the website? Also, I thought it would free up some spaces if I remove them. However, I would love to hear what’s the best thing to do here.
Extra info: I’m not planning to use the old domain anymore so once the subscription for that domain ends later this year I will not extend it.
Thank you!
If you have moved all of the content over and created your redirects then you can feel free to remove the old site and its content
Hi. I have two questions. The first is how long should the 1st step from the installer take? It’s been extracting the archive files for about 20 minutes and my site isnt that big.
Also, is setting up the 301 redirects and updating google about the changes necessary if I’m only using the cloned site as a template for the new one? Any pages that are remaining the same will be deleted from the old site.
Thanks in advance!
It would depend on the size of the site for how long it would take and the 301 redirects are to ensure traffic from your old site is sent to the new site rather than the old address that would not have the content anymore
I have never done this before, so your instructions were excellent. For any newbies like me – just go through slowly and read each instruction carefully and it will work perfectly.
Glad our guide was able to help you transfer your site
Great guide! I successfully moved my site to a new domain using the exact processalthough I have to purchase Duplicator Pro to make it work.
My question is this: what should I do with the WordPress content on the old domain? Should I just uninstall/delete everything and leave the .htaccess file in there?
That would be a personal preference question, you certainly can remove it and leave the .htaccess as the simplest option
Hii
After changing domain name do I need to take apply for AdSense again? my previous domain already has AdSense approved. Do I need to reapply for a new domain name?
You would need to add the new domain to your sites list on your current AdSense account
this is what i get after i uploaded the file successfully
Error establishing a database connection
There are a few possible reasons, you would want to start by taking a look at our guide here: https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/how-to-fix-the-error-establishing-a-database-connection-in-wordpress/
After Move WordPress to a New Domain , How can i change url in Adsense account. And any effect on my adsense earning becouse my blog 2 year old.
You would need to add your new domain to your sites list in your Adsense settings. For earnings, there are too many factors beyond the domain name for us to give you an idea about any changes.