Moving your website to a new host sounds risky. Most business owners put it off for years, even when their site is slow, support is poor or the renewal price has doubled. Done in the right order, though, a move takes a few hours of work, and your visitors never notice.
This guide explains when it’s worth moving, what you need before you start, and the steps to move a website (including WordPress) without losing emails, rankings or enquiries.
Signs it’s time to change web host
- Your site is slow. Cheap shared hosting is one of the most common causes of slow pages, and slow pages lose visitors and enquiries.
- It goes down. If customers tell you your site is offline before your host does, that’s a problem.
- Support is hard to reach. A ticket queue and a chatbot aren’t much use when your site is broken.
- The price jumped at renewal. Many hosts offer a cheap first year, then charge several times more.
- No proper backups. If your host doesn’t take daily backups stored away from the server, one hack or failed update can wipe out your site.
- Your site has outgrown the plan. More traffic, a shop or bookings often need more resources.
Before you start: what you’ll need
- Access to your domain. The login for wherever your domain name is registered (this is often, but not always, your current host).
- Access to your current hosting. A control panel such as cPanel or Plesk, plus FTP or a file manager.
- Your WordPress admin login, if your site runs on WordPress.
- A list of your email accounts. If your email runs through your hosting, it needs moving too. This is the bit most people forget.
- A full backup, downloaded to your own computer, before anything else.
Don’t cancel your old hosting yet. Keep it running until the move is finished and checked.
How to move your website, step by step
1. Set up your new hosting
Choose a plan that fits your site and add your domain to it. Don’t change anything about the domain yet. Your current site keeps running as normal while you work.
2. Copy your files and database
A WordPress site has two parts: the files (themes, plugins, images) and the database (pages, posts, settings). Both need copying. Migration plugins can bundle them up for you, or you can copy the files by FTP and export the database from phpMyAdmin. Many hosts will do this step for you. We include it free with annual hosting plans.
3. Test the site on the new server
Before anyone else sees it, check the copy works. Most hosts give you a temporary address, or you can edit your computer’s hosts file to preview the new server. Click through the main pages, submit a contact form and check images load.
4. Move your email
If your email accounts are on your hosting, create the same accounts on the new host and copy old messages across (or use the move as a chance to switch to Google Workspace or Microsoft 365). Do this before the next step, or new emails may get lost.
5. Point your domain to the new host
This is the actual switch. Update your domain’s nameservers or DNS records to point at the new server. The change can take anything from a few minutes to 24 hours to reach everyone, and during that time some visitors see the old server and some the new one. Because both copies are identical, nobody notices. Lowering the DNS “TTL” a day beforehand speeds things up.
6. Check everything again
Once the change has gone through:
- Make sure the padlock (SSL certificate) shows on every page.
- Test contact forms, bookings and checkout.
- Send and receive a test email.
- Check Google Search Console for errors over the next week.
7. Cancel the old hosting
Wait a week or two, take one last backup from the old host for safekeeping, then cancel.
Will moving host affect my Google rankings?
Not if your web addresses stay the same. Google cares about your pages and links, not which server they sit on. In fact, moving to faster hosting often helps a little, because page speed is one of the things Google takes into account. The risk comes from a broken or half-finished move, which is why testing before the switch matters.
Common mistakes to avoid
- Forgetting email, so messages bounce or disappear for a day.
- Cancelling the old host too early, before the new site is checked.
- Not taking your own backup before starting.
- Changing your web addresses at the same time without setting up redirects.
- Moving during your busiest week. Pick a quiet day.
Want us to move it for you?
We’re DM Media Solutions, a small web agency in North Wales working with businesses across the UK. Our web hosting includes free migration on annual plans (£49 per standard site on monthly plans): we move your site and email, test everything and handle the switch, so there’s no downtime and nothing for you to do. Prefer someone to keep an eye on it afterwards? Our website care plans cover updates, backups and security. Wondering whether you need paid hosting at all? Read free vs paid web hosting.
Message us on WhatsApp at +44 7737 351525 or get in touch. We’ll give you a straight answer and a fixed quote.
