How to migrate ANY type of website (to new webhost)

All websites can be easily migrated to another webhost or webserver.

I see people freaking out all the time when they’re forced to migrate non-WordPress sites. They don’t know how to do manual migrations (without easy plugins). But trust me, it’s easy!

STEP #1 – copy the files

Copy from old server to new server. It’s helpful if you compress the files into an archive first.

STEP #2 – copy the database

Export from phpmyadmin. If it’s too big, use the compression option. If it’s still too big, export only a few tables at a time. And if it’s still too big for that…then you need to export from from the command line or use a DB backup/dump tool. Worst case scenario, you have to ask your webhost to export the database for you.

STEP #3 – edit the configuration file

All website CMS have a configuration file. In WordPress, it’s the wp-config.php. In other CMS like Joomla, Drupal, whatever…it might be called something else. Usually it’s called “config” or “settings” and located in the root of the website directory or maybe the “configuration” directory. When in doubt, read the CMS documentation and find out.

Once you know which file to edit, you’ll probably have to change the follow things:

• DB name – since your new server may have a different name prefix
• DB user – same reason as above
• DB pass – in case you didn’t use new DB
• website directory path – since the new server path may be a different OS or store website files under different username and file structure
• any other areas – maybe you have to change the internal address from the old host IP to new server IP, or put “localhost”

Just check the documentation and you should be fine. Happy migrating!