WordPress Migration FAQ: 18 Real Questions, Honest Answers
Moving a WordPress site to a new host is one of those tasks that sounds scarier than it is — until something goes wrong, at which point it is exactly as scary as it sounds. This FAQ answers the questions site owners actually ask us about migrations: what breaks, what it costs, how long it takes, and when to let the professionals handle it.
Before You Migrate
1. Will my site go down during migration?
Not if it is done properly. The standard safe process is: copy everything to the new host, test the copy on a temporary address, and only then point your domain to the new server. Your live site stays up on the old host until the final switch, and DNS propagation — the only unavoidable downtime window — typically resolves within minutes to a few hours. Anyone who tells you migration inherently means downtime is describing a bad process, not a requirement.
2. Will migration hurt my SEO?
A clean migration does not hurt rankings. Google does not penalize you for changing hosts; it penalizes the symptoms of a bad migration — extended downtime, changed URLs, lost content, or a much slower site. Keep URLs identical, keep the site fast (or faster), and keep downtime near zero, and your rankings will be unaffected. The SEO risk of migration is real but entirely avoidable with the process described above.
3. How long does a WordPress migration take?
It depends on who does it and how big the site is. A professional migration team (Kinsta's team does these free and unlimited, for example) typically completes a standard site within a few hours to a day. A DIY migration with a plugin takes 30 minutes to a few hours of your time for a small site. Large sites — multiple gigabytes of media, complex databases — can take a day or more of transfer time regardless of method. The calendar time that matters most is DNS propagation after the switch: usually minutes, occasionally up to 24 hours.
4. What does migration cost?
Often nothing. Most managed WordPress hosts include free migrations: Kinsta offers free unlimited migrations handled by their team, SiteGround provides a free migrator plugin, and Cloudways includes one free migration. Paid migration services from a host's team typically run $25–100 per site when they are not included. Freelance developers charge anywhere from $50 to several hundred dollars depending on complexity. If someone quotes you thousands for a standard WordPress migration, get a second quote.
5. Can I migrate the site myself?
Yes, for a standard site. Migration plugins like Duplicator, All-in-One WP Migration, or Migrate Guru walk you through it: install on the old site, create a package, install on the new host, import. The honest caveat: DIY works well until it does not. Very large sites can hit PHP timeout or upload limits mid-transfer, multisite networks add complexity, and if something breaks halfway, you need to understand enough to fix it. Rule of thumb: if your site earns money, let the new host's team do it free. If it is a hobby blog, DIY is a fine learning experience.
6. What should I back up before migrating?
Everything, independently of the migration itself. Take a complete backup — files plus database — and download a copy to your own computer or separate cloud storage before anyone touches anything. Migration tools create their own copies during the process, but your own backup is the insurance policy if both the source and the migration go wrong simultaneously. This takes ten minutes and has saved more sites than any other single habit.
During the Migration
7. What exactly gets moved?
A complete WordPress migration moves four things: the WordPress files (themes, plugins, uploads), the database (posts, pages, settings, users), the domain configuration, and email — with a big asterisk on the last one (see question 9). SSL certificates do not transfer; the new host issues fresh ones, which takes minutes with free Let's Encrypt certificates. Server-level settings like PHP version and caching rules do not transfer either — the new host applies its own optimized stack, which is usually an improvement.
8. Do I need to reinstall WordPress on the new host?
No — and you should not. A proper migration moves your existing installation intact: same content, same settings, same plugins, same database. If a host or developer tells you they need to do a fresh WordPress install and rebuild your site, that is not a migration, that is a rebuild, and it should cost and be scoped accordingly. The only common exception is migrations from WordPress.com (the hosted service) to self-hosted WordPress, which is a platform move rather than a host-to-host migration.
9. What happens to my email?
This is the question that causes the most damage when ignored. Your email accounts live wherever your MX records point — often your old host. If you migrate the website but your email was hosted with the old provider, you must decide deliberately: keep email where it is (leave MX records pointing at the old host), or migrate email separately to Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, or a dedicated provider. What you must not do is cancel the old hosting account without checking where email lives. Every year, businesses lose email access for days because nobody asked this question before pulling the plug. Check first, migrate second, cancel last.
10. Will my contact forms and plugins still work?
Almost always yes, with two common exceptions. First, contact forms that sent mail through the old host's local mail server may need reconfiguration to use SMTP or a transactional email service on the new host. Second, caching and security plugins tuned for the old environment may conflict with the new host's built-in systems — managed hosts like Kinsta maintain a short list of banned plugins for exactly this reason. After migration, submit a test entry through every form and check that notification emails arrive.
11. What about my SSL certificate?
Your new host will issue a new free SSL certificate during or immediately after migration — on managed hosts this is typically automatic and takes minutes. There may be a brief window where the staging copy shows a certificate warning; that is normal and not a problem, because visitors are not on that address yet. What matters: verify the padlock is correct on your real domain after the DNS switch, and check for mixed-content warnings (some images or scripts loading over HTTP) which are easy to fix with a search-and-replace plugin.
After the Switch
12. How do I know the migration worked?
Run this checklist before you consider the job done: load the homepage and five inner pages; log into wp-admin; submit every form; complete a test purchase if you run a store; check the SSL padlock; run the site through a speed test and compare with your pre-migration baseline; and confirm email still flows (send and receive). Do all of this on the live domain after DNS has propagated to you — testing only the staging copy is the most common way migrations "succeed" while the live site is broken.
13. When can I cancel the old hosting account?
Not yet. Keep the old account active for at least 7–14 days after migration. Reasons: DNS propagation can take up to 48 hours in rare cases; you may discover something that did not transfer; and your old host is your instant rollback plan. Cancel only after the checklist above passes and a full week of normal operation. And re-read question 9 about email before you cancel anything, ever.
14. My site is slower after migrating to a "faster" host. What happened?
This happens more than hosts admit, and the causes are diagnosable. The most common: DNS is still resolving to the old host for some visitors (wait for full propagation); the new host's caching is not yet warmed up or not configured for your setup; a plugin that was dormant is now conflicting with the new stack; or the baseline comparison was flawed (you tested the old site cached and the new site cold). Give it 24–48 hours, clear all caches, re-test, and if the gap persists, ask the new host's support — on a good managed host, they will actually investigate rather than blame your theme.
15. Do I need to notify Google about the host change?
No. There is no "change of host" notification in Search Console and Google does not need one. What Google notices is the result: if the site stays up, keeps its URLs, and loads as fast or faster, nothing changes in the index. If you want belt and suspenders, you can use the URL inspection tool on a few key pages after migration to confirm Google sees them correctly — but this is verification, not notification.
Tricky Cases
16. Can I migrate a WooCommerce store without losing orders?
Yes, but it needs a freeze window. The risk with stores (and membership sites, forums — anything with user-generated data) is orders placed on the old site after you copied the database to the new host. The safe process: put the old site in maintenance mode briefly, take a final fresh copy of everything, move it, test, switch DNS, and lift maintenance mode. Total interruption: typically under an hour, often minutes. Some managed hosts have specific WooCommerce migration procedures — ask their team rather than improvising.
17. What about multisite networks or very large sites?
WordPress multisite migrations are genuinely harder: domain mapping, shared database tables, and per-site media paths all add failure modes. Very large sites (tens of gigabytes) can exceed plugin transfer limits and PHP timeouts. For both cases, our honest recommendation is to use the new host's professional migration team rather than a plugin — this is exactly the scenario where "free migrations by our engineers" earns its keep. If you must DIY, Migrate Guru handles large sites better than most plugins because it chunks the transfer through its own servers.
18. I migrated and something is broken. What now?
Do not panic and do not start changing things at random. First, determine scope: is it the whole site (likely DNS or server config) or specific pages (likely permalinks, mixed content, or a plugin conflict)? Two one-minute fixes solve a large share of post-migration issues: re-save your permalink settings (fixes most 404 errors), and clear every layer of cache (plugin, host, CDN, browser). If the site is down entirely, check whether DNS has propagated to you yet — online DNS checkers show what the rest of the world sees. And remember question 13: your old host is still active, which means rollback is always one DNS change away. That safety net is the reason the process above keeps the old site alive until you are sure.
The Bottom Line
WordPress migration is a solved problem with a well-worn safe process: back up independently, copy everything, test on a temporary address, switch DNS, verify with a checklist, and keep the old host for two weeks. Follow that sequence and the scary stories do not apply to you. Skip steps — especially the email check and the independent backup — and you join the cautionary tales. When in doubt, use the new host's free migration team: it costs nothing and transfers the risk to people who do this hundreds of times a month.