Moving here from my paid domain
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I take it a site ending in .wordpress.com has free hosting from wordpress… If so – I’m wanting to leave my paid hosting service with my pure domain – to this option. How do I move it here? My site is already built in wordpress. I’m having trouble moving the files – I could go into details- but wondering if that’s necessary since it’s already built in wordpress. I’ve already tried this link: https://wordpress.com/support/moving-from-self-hosted-wordpress-to-wordpress-com/ but those import options listed are not coming up for me- I’ve been working fruitlessly on this for 3 days now – help appreciated.
Site: (email visible only to moderators and staff).
WP.com: Yes
Correct account: Yes -
Hi there,
The most common issue with migrating a self-hosted WordPress site to Free WordPress.com is that it’s not possible to upload plugins or themes on our free sites. This will mean that you can import your contents (pages, blog posts, comment, uploaded media, etc) but not your theme design or any plugins you have uploaded.
Out of curiosity, you are trying to move an exact copy of your site as it is now? I did not see you share the URL but we’re happy to take a look at your site and see what would be involved in moving it over to us. Please also note that if you decide to switch to the free “wordpress.com” domain, we still recommend connecting your previous domain for at least a year, which will automatically redirect traffic allow site visitors time to update their bookmarks and for Google to update their listings as well.
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Sure thing-
I already disabled all my plug-ins and took note of what they are I’m not terribly worried about that there’s nothing really complex and I realize I might have to take her with it a little bit afterward which is fine. The site is wrenkraft.com So I’m not a website person at all- I didn’t know you could redirect a domain to a WordPress site outside of just getting it hosted elsewhere. I take it there’s a fee for that redirect ? As of right now all of the editing I do on the site is done in WordPress. -
Hi again,
I think it will help if I clarify that your host uses the open-source variant of the WordPress platform which functions a bit differently than what we offer here on WordPress.com since we are a managed host.
In this way you could consider us to be a peer to iPage (where you are hosted now) in that we both offer WordPress sites. We are different however in that we offer a fully managed experience where we take care of security, backups, software updates, brute force login protection, hosting configuration, and also offer in-house support for any questions you have about your site.
So it is possible to move your site to us, but you can think of it more as switching providers. I see nothing about wrenkraft.com that you cannot have as a free site here on WordPress.com so you should be able to make this switch without issue. Are you getting stuck on a specific step from the guide here or seeing an error message of some kind? https://wordpress.com/support/moving-from-self-hosted-wordpress-to-wordpress-com/
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The goal here is to make this site a free site now whether the domain remains or needs a wordpress.com on the end to make it free- either is fine by me. No offense to iPage- but I’m ready to break free of fees with this particular site.
So the problem I was having- in just following one of your instruction links… assuming I’m doing the right method: In my wordpress site on the bottom of the left banner I go to tools / import / (seeing several different site names – I pick wordpress) / the only option then is “run importer” then it asks me to upload a file smaller than 20 mb… My entire site that I downloaded from iPage is like 30 gb…
and this was doubly confusing because whenever I work on the site I always upload to wordpress so I feel like everything is in there somewhere… -
When you download your site from iPage, that usually means you have downloaded all contents form the server to your computer. But it may surprise you to find that this is not the same as “exporting” and “importing” as it’s referred to in our guide.
In this case you will want to go to https://wrenkraft.com/wp-admin/export.php and create an export file for your site. Export files are much smaller because they do not contain all the files, but instead contain instructions that we use to import the data from the iPage server.
This will download a small XML file to your computer. Once you have that you can come here, and chose the option to “upload it to import content” on this page: https://wordpress.com/import/wrenkraft.wordpress.com
Once you do that, you may need to wait for the import to finish but once it is you should see a copy of all blog posts, pages, and uploaded media here on WordPress.com.
By the way, if you want your site here to have the same look, we happen to offer the same theme your iPage site is using. You an click the option on this page to activate it: https://wordpress.com/theme/twentyfourteen/
Hope that helps. Please let us know if you have any more questions.
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Thanks for getting me this far- so very helpful- was able to get the download… looks like it’s making me buy a business plan to do this transfer – am I missing something or is this the only way?
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Is it wordpress.org I need? I have other sites- just the whole point of this move was to move to a free blog platform & free costs. Once again- you’ve been awesome help!
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Hi there!
Thanks for getting me this far- so very helpful- was able to get the download… looks like it’s making me buy a business plan to do this transfer – am I missing something or is this the only way?
You don’t need to buy the Business plan to import content. However, I do see that you have the Business plan on your cart along with the domain wrenkraft.com. Do you want to use the custom domain on your WordPress.com site or are you fine with using the free WordPress.com address?
Using a custom domain on WordPress.com sites requires a paid plan. This can be any of our paid plans listed here: https://wordpress.com/plans – Once you’ve upgraded to a paid plan, you can follow one of these instructions:
* Using a domain you already own elsewhere without transferring it to us (Domain Connection)
* Transferring a domain registration to WordPress.comHowever, if you’re fine with the free WordPress.com address, you don’t need a paid plan. Please make sure to go to https://wordpress.com/checkout/wrenkraft.wordpress.com → click Edit → click Remove from cart. This will remove the subscriptions from your cart.
Finally, here are the instructions to import the content using the file that you downloaded (using the Export feature on your existing site): https://wordpress.com/support/import/#import-content-from-another-word-press-site
Is it wordpress.org I need?
Any WordPress site that’s hosted elsewhere is using the WordPress.org site. So your current site at https://wrenkraft.com is using WordPress.org. When moving to us at WordPress.com, you don’t need WordPress.org as sites with us are already hosted.
Please follow the import instructions from the link above and let us know if you have more questions.
Regards
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Cool- Thanks so much! To answer your question…
Yes I’m good with the free wordpress.com address – I followed everything in the tutorial- at the end it said, “you’re done – have fun!” But it still looks like my url is wrenkraft.com instead of wrenkraft.wordpress.com.
Did I migrate it correctly to wordpress hosting & out of ipage? I’m not complaining but shouldn’t my url have changed? -
Hi there,
Now you have two different sites. wrenkraft.wordpress.com, which is hosted by us (WordPress.com), and wrenkraft.com which is still hosted by iPage.
If you want to use your domain wrenkraft.com here on WordPress.com and make it your site’s primary address, then you’ll need to purchase one of our annual plans.
If you remain on the Free plan you’ll only be able to have the free .wordpress.com address.
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Thanks for the help. I’d like to only have wrenkraft.wordpress.com but it looks like none of the site transferred- it’s just a generic template. What I’ve been trying to do this whole time is move all of my content & site to wrenkraft.wordpress.com
Looks like that didn’t work- where did I go wrong? -
The idea is I’m leaving iPage & it’s hosting completely in a few days- so the .Wordpress.com site needs to be able to be running all on its own & free.
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I’ll try to clarify a few things and follow up with a question to make sure we’re keeping track of your goals.
1. Your goal is to move (“migrate”) your site from iPage to WordPress.com.
2. You are OK with your domain here at WordPress.com appearing as “wrenkraft.wordpress.com”.
3. You have properly used the “export” feature at iPage.
4. You are now trying to use the “import” feature here at WordPress.com and it has so far not worked.
it looks like none of the site transferred- it’s just a generic template.
Can you tell us exactly what you did when you tried to import the export file? And did that process complete?
As a guiding reference, here’s our info on how to import: https://wordpress.com/support/import/
We should be close to getting this done, and look forward to your reply. :)
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1. Yes
2. Yes
3. Not sure- I started downloading the site from them- but it was taking over 8 hours- so I followed instructions on this thread that said all I needed to do was get the xml (sp?) file from WordPress.
After downloading that I went in my WordPress site to Tools / Import / WordPress / Run importer / attach that xml file / select all- submit
4. Correct- you will see in this thread exactly what I did & the confirmation I got from WordPress5. Hope we are- thanks for the help
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Not sure- I started downloading the site from them- but it was taking over 8 hours- so I followed instructions on this thread that said all I needed to do was get the xml (sp?) file from WordPress.
To clarify, you got that XML file from https://wrenkraft.com/wp-admin/export.php ?
And you’re importing to https://wordpress.com/import/wrenkraft.wordpress.com ?
If so, we’re not seeing any XML files being uploaded to your site, which should be occurring if you’re starting an import process (whether it succeeds or not).
Additionally, we need to clarify a couple things:
1. An import will only import your site’s content (blog posts, pages, media). Any themes or other customizations your site is using now will NOT be transferred.
2. Your site currently at
wrenkraft.comwon’t automatically redirect to your newwrenkraft.wordpress.comsite – you would need to set up a URL redirect with your domain registrar so any traffic that goes towrenkraft.comgets redirected towrenkraft.wordpress.com.Since your domain
wrenkraft.comis also registered at iPage and your intention is to close that account, we recommend you transfer the domain here to WordPress.com so you don’t lose it – otherwise any visitors to that domain will be met with an error message. Here’s more information about this process:https://wordpress.com/support/move-domain/incoming-domain-transfer/
If you transfer the domain here to WordPress.com, the redirect to your free
wrenkraft.wordpress.comURL will be included in the domain registration fees ($18 per year, which is standard for domain names).I know that was a lot of information here, but we want to make sure you get everything set up the way you want it to.
We’ll wait to hear back!
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Yes- That is how I exported and and imported it. I’m doing it again now- so hopefully it will work this time
I don’t care about the themes and plugins- just was to move the content.
I’m first wanting to get the new site working then will worry about redirecting…
I’m confused though because you said the domain is registered with iPage- but I registered that with GoDaddy & even have a receipt I just confirmed it on. That’s good to know for the future though -
Cool- looks like it worked now- 2nd time is a charm …hopefully! I am confused about the domain name registration though or where you are seeing that.
One final question… so when everything with ipage closes I will not lose my content- right? It is solid in it’s place with wordpress now? -
Hi there!
I’m confused though because you said the domain is registered with iPage- but I registered that with GoDaddy & even have a receipt I just confirmed it on. That’s good to know for the future though
Apologies for our confusion there. The domain is indeed registered at GoDaddy, as you mentioned, and it’s only pointing to iPage hosting.
You’d want to keep the domain registered if you don’t want to lose it regardless of where it’s registered at.
Do you plan on using the domain with your WordPress.com site? Or are you okay with continuing with the wrenkraft.wordpress.com address? We can advise on the next steps depending on your goals. :)
One final question… so when everything with ipage closes I will not lose my content- right? It is solid in it’s place with wordpress now?
I do see that a lot of content has been imported into your site. I’d suggest spending some time visiting your WordPress.com site
wrenkraft.wordpress.comand verifying that everything — images, posts, pages, etc. — has been imported successfully. Once you have confirmed that everything has been imported, you can then delete your site with iPage if you no longer want to keep that.Hope that helps!
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