How to Migrate a WordPress Site to a New Host

Managed WordPress hosts treat migration as an acquisition cost. As published in July 2026: Kinsta's team performs free migrations from any host on every plan, Cloudways gives every account one free managed migration plus an unlimited-use migrator plugin, and Rocket.net advertises free migrations handled by staff. If you're paying managed prices, you should not be doing the migration yourself.

What host migrations don't cover: your DNS cutover timing, email (managed WP hosts don't host mail at all — plan mailboxes separately), and anything living outside WordPress like standalone scripts or subdomain apps.

Migration plugins package the site (files plus database) into an archive you restore on the new host. They handle the detail that breaks naive copies: WordPress stores absolute URLs throughout its database, and the plugin rewrites them for the new environment, including inside serialized data where a plain text-replace corrupts settings.

Two caveats from the field: very large sites (tens of GB of uploads) can exceed plugin and PHP limits — move the uploads folder separately by SFTP — and some managed hosts restrict backup/migration plugins that conflict with their own systems; check the receiving host's allowed-plugin list first.

Copy wp-content (themes, plugins, uploads), export the database with a search-replace pass for the URL and file paths (respecting serialized data — use a WP-aware tool, not a text editor), create the database on the new host, update wp-config.php credentials, and point a test hostname at it before touching production DNS.

Then follow the standard cutover discipline from our general guide: TTL down a day early, switch DNS in a quiet hour, keep the old host alive for two weeks. WordPress adds one extra check — log in and re-save permalinks on the new host, the classic fix for 404s after a move.