The reason many people stay on a host they are unhappy with is simple: moving looks risky. It is easier than it sounds, and you can do it without your site ever going offline.
Before you start
- Keep your old hosting running until the move is finished and checked. Do not cancel it first.
- Make a backup of your site and database, just in case.
- Know where your domain is registered. You will change its settings at the end, not at the beginning.
The move, step by step
- Choose a plan and add your domain. Pick the plan that matches your site. See which plan fits if you are unsure.
- Ask us to move the site for you. In your dashboard open your website and choose Move my existing site. It opens a short request: tell us where the site lives now. Our team does the move. Pro plans include free migration.
- Check the new copy. We tell you when it is ready. Look through your pages, forms and checkout before anything goes live.
- Point your domain to Hostoa. Only now do you change the domain's settings. Our guide Point your domain to Hostoa shows exactly which records to change.
- Wait a little, then cancel the old host. Changes can take a few hours to spread across the internet. Keep the old hosting for a few days to be safe.
A trick for zero downtime
A day before you switch, lower the TTL (the cache time) on your domain's records to a few minutes at your DNS provider. Then, when you change them, visitors reach the new server almost immediately.
What about email?
If your email is at a different provider, such as Google Workspace or Microsoft 365, it is not affected by moving your website. Only change the records that point your website, not the MX records that deliver your mail. If your email was hosted with your old host, tell us in your request and we will help you plan it.
If something looks wrong
Do not panic. The old site is still there. Tell us what you see and we will fix it, or you can point the domain back while we do.
Ready to move? Choose a plan, and open Move my existing site from your dashboard.
