Moving A WordPress Website Without Hassle | Smashing WordPress

Moving WordPress is a task that many people find daunting. The advice on the Codex, while comprehensive, gives you a myriad of options and doesn’t describe the process simply and in one place.

When I had to move a WordPress installation for the first time, I spent hours searching online for information on the various aspects of the process, and eventually wrote myself a checklist — which I still use.

So to save you the hassle, here’s a step-by-step guide to moving a WordPress website. I’ll cover three different scenarios, which in my experience are the most common:

• Moving a website from a subdirectory of a domain to the root directory (for example, if you’ve been using a subdirectory for development while not affecting an existing website that’s in the root);
• Moving a website from a local installation to a remote installation; and
• Moving a website between domains or hosts.