How to Migrate a WordPress Site Manually

Manual migration comprises of primarily 3 steps, i.e. Take backup of your website files and database on your local computer, transfer them to the destination hosting provider & then update the wp-config.php file. All this can be done via the file manager provided in your hosting control panel or using an FTP client like win-scp or FileZilla.

Step 1. Back up Your WordPress Files and MySQL Database

1. Connect to your old website server via FTP using win-scp or FileZilla.
2. Navigate to the public_html folder and select all the files inside it.
3. Then download them to your local computer.

or

4. Another way is to open File Manager in your old website control panel, select the files mentioned above and compress them to a zip file. Then download the zip file via the above method.

or

5. Login to your website server via SSH (how to login can be found out from your hosting provider). Navigate to the public_html folder and use the command “tar -zcvf <filename.tgz> *” without the quotes. It’ll create a gzipped tar file containing all the files in the public_html folder, which you can then download via FTP, as mentioned above.

After the download is finished, it’s time to create a backup of your MySQL database:

1. Open the phpMyAdmin page from your control panel.
2. Select the database for the website you’re migrating and press the Export button.
3. Pick the Quick method to export your entire database, and then choose SQL as the format.
4. Click Go. Save the exported database backup file to a directory on your local PC.

Step 2.  Upload the backed up files to Your New Host

You may use any FTP client as mentioned in Step 1 above, to upload the backed up WordPress files to the public_html directory of your website, on the new hosting server. If you uploaded a compressed file, then you must uncompress it via file manager after upload.

After this is done, we’ll have to create a new database in the new hosting provider’s control panel and import the database backup:

1. Open the control panel of your new hosting account and head over to MySQL Databases.
2. Create a new database and take note of the database name, username, and password.
3. Head back to Databases -> phpMyAdmin and select your new database.
4. Click the Import tab at the top of the page.
5. Select the Choose File button and upload the MySQL backup file that you had downloaded from the old hosting provider.
6. Leave all settings as they are and hit Go.

Step 3.  Update wp-config.php with Your New Database Details

Next, specify the credentials of your new MySQL database by editing the wp-config.php file in your new hosting account.

1. Reaccess the public_html folder from File Manager in your new hosting control panel and locate the wp-config.php file.
2. Edit the file and change these values with your new database details:
   • DB_NAME – database name.
   • DB_USER – database username.
   • DB_PASSWORD – user password.
   • DB_HOST – database hostname (this value is usually localhost, but it may vary depending on your hosting platform).
   • Select Save, then a popup window will appear. Click Yes.

That’s it, folks, if your domain name is already pointing to your website with the new hosting provider and all of the steps above are performed properly, then you should be able to access your website from your new hosting provider now.