Starting on April 23, Bluehost began offering free website migrations for qualifying WordPress websites within the first 30 days after signup. The offer includes the transfer of one WordPress website and the ability to review the site before it goes live.

Availability

This offer will be available for a limited time, starting April 23, 2020.

Offer Details

• Transfer of one WordPress.org site
  • Additional sites must be covered under a paid website transfer*
  • Additional WordPress sites nested in sub-directories count against this quota.
• Emails are not included.
• Transfer completion estimated 2-3 days after receiving valid previous hosting credentials

Please note: Domain name transfers are not included. If you need to transfer your domain name, please see Transferring a Domain Name to Us.

Eligibility

Customer Qualification	Website Qualification
Must be initiated within the first 30 days of signup Requires a new shared hosting account One time use only - cannot have used the free migration offer previously.	WordPress.org (cannot be WordPress.com) Running WordPress version 4.7 or later Running PHP 7.0 or later We must have file and database access via FTP, SSH, or a hosting control panel Backups are accepted but do not guarantee a successful migration. Less than 2GB (filesize) Less than 20MB database size No proprietary features Free of malware Not a multi-site

If you do not qualify for the free migration offer, you can still request a professional migration. To learn more about how Bluehost can give you peace of mind and save you the hassle of moving your website, please visit our Professional Services page.

Signing up for the Free WordPress Migration Offer

You will be able to claim your free migration through our site at signup or within the first 30 days of signing up from the Marketplace.

1. Log in to the destination account (the account that you want to migrate to).
2. Click  Marketplace, then choose Professional Services.
3. Click Pro Services from the side navigation menu to the left, then click on the Site Migration tile.
4. Under the Free Site Migration option, agree to the free migration terms and conditions, then click Get Started Now.
5. Enter the domain name into the entry field, and check compatibility.

   This checks to see if your site is a WordPress site. If you use a CDN, it may interfere, in which case, you can log in to your dashboard to proceed.

6. Once compatibility has been verified, you will need to log in to your WordPress admin dashboard and install the Bluehost Site Migrator plugin.

   The plugin must be installed and activated on the completed WordPress site that is being migrated, NOT the new WordPress installation content is being migrated to.

7. Once the plugin is installed and activated, a menu item will appear on the left-hand side menu titled Site Migrator.
8. Click Site Migrator. If the screen is blank, scroll down, and the content should appear.
9. Click check compatibility.

   If the compatibility check fails, the site may be too large. In that case, you will need to purchase a paid migration.

10. Click through the prompted steps after checking compatibility. The process can occasionally still fail at this point. If generating backups fails, it’s most likely that you have run out of disk space. If you see a message that says, “It looks like your site didn’t transfer,” the server that you are currently hosted on is most likely too slow to connect to our server to transfer the files. 
11. Once you have logged in after clicking on the final link provided by the plugin, the ProServe team will receive the backups, and the project will be added to their queue. 

    NOTE: In some cases, a Site Migration cannot be completed automatically due to limitations and, therefore, will be manually migrated by our Professional Service Team. You will be contacted via email if your migration cannot be completed automatically.

12. Once the Transfer is complete, you will be able to Review and Approve your Site on a temporary URL. When you click “Review Site,” your website will open up in a new tab to allow you to confirm that your website looks correct.

    NOTE: Please note that some Images or Pages may not be displayed on the Temporary URL if their links reference the domain name, which is normal. These images and links should work properly after you have completed the steps below.

13. After clicking “Approve Site,” we will make the final adjustments on our side to finalize the transfer of your website to Bluehost.

    NOTE: After this step, you will no longer be able to preview your site using the Temporary Domain from the previous step.

14. The final step is to Connect Your Domain! Contact your Hosting Provider for your Domain name to change your name servers to the correct Bluehost name servers. Click here for more information.

    Please note: Updating your Nameservers can overwrite any Custom DNS settings that may exist for your domain name. Please contact your Hosting Provider to determine if your domain is using custom DNS to manage Email, Subdomains, Newsletters, or other services in order to prevent these services from being impacted.

Pro Tip! If you need further assistance with your WordPress website after it has been migrated, our BlueSky Team can teach you more about managing and building your site.