How to Migrate a WordPress Site to Noiz Hosting

This guide walks you through moving an existing WordPress site onto Noiz hosting, whether it currently lives on WordPress.com or on another web host. The task goes by several names, including "migration", "moving", "transferring", and "importing", but they do not all mean the same thing, and the single most common mistake is choosing the wrong one. There are really two jobs hiding under one word: a content import, which carries your posts and pages but nothing else, and a full-site migration, which copies your entire site (files and database) so the new copy is identical to the old one. This guide explains the difference plainly, shows you the manual route, the migration-plugin route, and the special case of leaving WordPress.com, and then covers the part most tutorials skip: pointing your domain at Noiz cleanly, and proving the move actually worked before you switch off the old host.

Last reviewed: 27 July 2026, against WordPress 7.0.2 (latest stable). This guide is written for Noiz hosting and is kept current against WordPress. It complements, and does not replace, the official WordPress documentation linked below.

Official Documentation Reference

• Migrating WordPress (Advanced Administration): the official reference for moving a site to a new server, keeping or changing your domain, and the warning about serialised data.
• Backing Up Your Database and Files (Backups): the two halves of a WordPress backup, database and files, and why you need both to move a site faithfully.
• Tools Export screen: what the built-in exporter produces (a WXR file) and exactly which content it does and does not contain.
• Tools Import screen: how to bring a WXR export into a WordPress site, including author mapping and downloading attachments.
• WordPress Importer (plugin directory): the official importer that reads a WXR file and can fetch media attachments from the old site.
• Export your content (WordPress.com support): the authoritative account of what a WordPress.com export includes, and its important limits.
• wp search-replace (WP-CLI): the serialisation-safe way to update URLs across the database when your domain changes.

Prerequisites

• Administrator access to the site you are moving from, and to the fresh WordPress on Noiz you are moving to. If you are unsure how to reach either dashboard, see how to log in to the WordPress admin dashboard.
• A Noiz hosting plan with somewhere for the site to live: a domain or subdomain set up in your panel, with PHP and MySQL/MariaDB available (every Noiz WordPress plan provides these).
• A way to move files: an SFTP client, or the File Manager in your hosting panel. Both reach the same web space.
• Access to phpMyAdmin for the databases, reachable from your Noiz panel.
• A complete, tested backup of the source site taken immediately before you begin. A migration is exactly the moment you are most glad to have one.
• Patience with DNS. The final domain switch is not instant, and rushing it is the usual cause of a "half-moved" site.

If your site is on a Noiz managed plan and any of this feels daunting, you do not have to do it yourself. The Noiz support team can carry out the whole migration for you; skip to the closing section.

First Decide: Content Import or Full-Site Migration

This one decision shapes everything that follows, so make it deliberately.

A content import uses WordPress's own export and import tools. It moves your writing: posts, pages, comments, categories, tags, custom fields, and (with the right option) your media files. It does not move your theme, your plugins, your settings, your menus, or your widgets. You rebuild those by hand on the new site. This is the right choice when your site is mostly a blog, when the old and new sites will look deliberately different, or when you are leaving WordPress.com (where a full copy is not possible; see the next section).

A full-site migration copies the two things that are your site: the files (WordPress core, your theme, your plugins, and uploads) and the database (your content and every setting). Done properly, the Noiz copy is indistinguishable from the original, down to the widgets and plugin configuration. This is the right choice for any established, self-hosted site, and it is almost always what people actually mean by "migrate".

As a rule of thumb: if you are moving from another host and want the same site, choose full-site migration. If you are moving from WordPress.com, or deliberately starting fresh, choose a content import.

Special Case: Leaving WordPress.com

WordPress.com and self-hosted WordPress share the same software family, but a WordPress.com site is a managed, sandboxed environment, so you cannot lift its files and database off the platform the way you can with a normal host. What you can take is your content, and it is important to know precisely what that means before you rely on it.

The WordPress.com export produces a WXR file (a WordPress-flavoured XML file) containing your posts, pages, comments, categories, and tags, together with links to your media rather than the media files themselves. It deliberately excludes your theme design and customisations, and any plugin-style functionality, because those are provided by the platform and do not exist as portable files. In short, a WordPress.com export is a content-only transfer.

What this means in practice when you land on Noiz:

• You will install a fresh WordPress on Noiz and import the WXR file into it (Method A below).
• You must rebuild the look: choose and configure a theme, recreate your menus and widgets, and install the plugins that give you the features WordPress.com bundled in.
• Your images need to come across too. The importer can download them from your old WordPress.com media library automatically (the "download and import file attachments" option), and WordPress.com also lets you export the media library as a separate download if you would rather bring the files yourself. Either way, confirm the images actually arrive; this is the step that most often fails silently.
• Some WordPress.com features rely on the Jetpack service. If you used those, you will replicate the equivalent functionality with standalone plugins on Noiz.

None of this is a shortcoming of Noiz; it is simply the boundary of what WordPress.com allows you to take with you. The upside is that on Noiz you own the whole site outright, with full access to files, database, themes, and any plugins you like.

Prepare the Noiz Side First

Whichever method you use, you need a place for the site to arrive. Set this up before you touch the old host.

1. Point your domain or a subdomain at Noiz in the panel. Noiz hosting runs on Plesk (on neo.noiz.co.za) for South African plans, DirectAdmin for Ireland, and ISPConfig for some accounts. In all three, you create the site so that a web space and a database can exist for it. You do not need to change your public DNS yet; that is the very last step.
2. Install a clean WordPress into that space, or leave the web space empty if you are going to upload the old site's files directly. Your panel's one-click installer is the quickest way to get a working WordPress and a matching database.
3. Note the new database details. A migration always needs the database name, database user, password, and host. Your panel creates these; keep them to hand for wp-config.php.
4. Check the versions roughly match. Aim for a PHP version on Noiz that is equal to or newer than the old host's, and make sure your WordPress is current (7.0.2). Moving to an older PHP or WordPress than the site was built on is the one direction that causes trouble.

Method A: Content Import (Posts and Pages)

This is the built-in route, and the only route out of WordPress.com. It is straightforward but remember what it leaves behind.

1. Export from the old site

On the source site, go to Tools > Export, choose All content, and download the WXR file to your computer. The official Tools Export screen reference lists exactly what the file holds. Keep this file safe; it is your content.

2. Import into the fresh Noiz WordPress

On the new site, go to Tools > Import, and under WordPress install and run the importer (the official WordPress Importer). Upload the WXR file and, when prompted:

• Map authors. Assign the imported posts to an existing user on the new site, or let the importer create the original authors as new users. Choose deliberately, so posts end up under the right name.
• Tick "Download and import file attachments". This is what pulls your images across from the old site into the Noiz media library. If you skip it, your posts will still point at images hosted on the old site, which breaks the moment you switch that host off.

3. Rebuild everything the import did not carry

Now do the work a content import always leaves for you: install and configure your theme, recreate menus and widgets, install the plugins you need, and reset options such as your site title, tagline, and permalink structure. Set the permalink structure to match the old site if you want existing links and search rankings to survive.

Watch out for large exports

A big site can produce a WXR file too large for the importer to swallow in one go, especially with attachment downloading switched on. If the import stalls or times out, split the export into smaller files (the export screen lets you filter by date range, for example) and import them in sequence. On a Noiz managed plan, support can raise the relevant limits or run the import for you.

Method B: Full-Site Migration (Files and Database)

This is the faithful copy, and for a self-hosted site it is usually the better choice. You move the site's two halves separately, then join them back together. It sounds involved but it is just careful copying.

1. Back up and gather both halves on the old host

On the source site, take a full backup and download both parts to your computer: the entire WordPress folder (all the files, including the wp-content directory with your themes, plugins, and uploads), and a full export of the database. The official Backups guide explains why you need both halves; one without the other is not a working site.

2. Move the files into your Noiz web space

Upload the files into the site's document root on Noiz using SFTP or the panel File Manager. If you installed a clean WordPress on Noiz earlier and only want the old site's content and customisations, the reliable approach is to overwrite wp-content and keep the fresh core, rather than mixing two WordPress versions. Preserve the folder structure exactly as it was.

3. Move the database with phpMyAdmin

Export the source database as a single SQL file (from the source host's phpMyAdmin or backup tool). Then, in the phpMyAdmin on your Noiz panel, select the empty database you created earlier and import that SQL file into it. If the file is large, compress it first; phpMyAdmin happily imports a .sql.gz or .zip, which sidesteps the upload size limit that trips people up on big databases.

4. Point wp-config.php at the new database

The database name, user, and password on Noiz are almost certainly different from the old host's. Edit wp-config.php in the site's root and update these four lines to match the Noiz database you noted earlier:

define( 'DB_NAME', 'your_noiz_db_name' );
define( 'DB_USER', 'your_noiz_db_user' );
define( 'DB_PASSWORD', 'your_noiz_db_password' );
define( 'DB_HOST', 'localhost' );

(localhost is correct on Noiz hosting in almost every case.) Get one of these four wrong and the site shows an "Error establishing a database connection"; that message is a wrong value here far more often than a real fault.

5. If the domain is changing, update the URLs (safely)

If the site is arriving on the same domain it left, skip this. If the domain is changing (for example from a staging address, or from a WordPress.com subdomain, or to a brand-new name), the site's old address is written all over the database and must be updated. This is the single most dangerous step in a migration, because of serialised data, and it has its own section below. Do not reach for a blunt find-and-replace.

Method C: The Migration-Plugin Route

If moving files and databases by hand feels like too much, a migration plugin automates the packaging and unpacking. WordPress's plugin directory offers several reputable ones; Noiz does not endorse a specific plugin, so compare current options and read recent reviews before choosing. The pattern they all follow is similar:

1. Install the migration plugin on the old site and let it bundle the files and database into a single package (some produce a package plus a small installer file).
2. Install a fresh WordPress on Noiz (or the same plugin), and hand it the package.
3. The plugin unpacks the files, imports the database, and updates the URLs for you.

This route is genuinely convenient, with two honest caveats. First, large sites can exceed a plugin's free-tier size limit or your server's execution time, at which point the manual Method B is more reliable. Second, you are trusting the plugin to handle the serialised-data URL rewrite correctly, so pick a well-established one and, as always, keep the backup you took at the start. On a Noiz managed plan, if a plugin migration stalls partway, support can complete the move the manual way.

Change the URLs Safely (Domain-Change Migrations Only)

When your domain changes, every stored copy of the old address, in your content, your theme options, your widgets, and your menus, needs updating to the new one. The catch is that WordPress stores a lot of settings as serialised data, a compact format that records the exact character length of each stored value. A naive database-wide find-and-replace changes the text but leaves those length markers wrong, which quietly corrupts widgets, theme options, and page-builder layouts. The official migration guide carries the same warning.

So do not run a raw REPLACE() query in phpMyAdmin against your URLs. Use a serialisation-aware method instead, which decodes the data, makes the change, and re-encodes it with the length markers corrected:

• WP-CLI, if you have SSH access, is the most reliable. Preview first with --dry-run, then run it, always protecting the guid column:

  wp search-replace 'https://oldsite.com' 'https://yourdomain.com' --skip-columns=guid

  See the official wp search-replace reference for the flags. (oldsite.com and yourdomain.com are examples; use your real addresses, including the exact protocol.)
• A serialisation-aware search-and-replace plugin, if you prefer not to use the command line. Choose one that clearly states it handles serialised data and offers a dry run, and leave the guid column out of the replacement.

Also set the site's own address explicitly: under Settings > General, confirm the WordPress Address and Site Address both show the new domain. After any URL change, go to Settings > Permalinks and click Save Changes to rebuild the link rules, then clear every cache. If you are locked out and cannot reach Settings at all, these two values can be set directly in the database; see how to work in phpMyAdmin for the technique, applied to the siteurl and home options.

Test Before You Switch the Domain Over

Here is the part that separates a smooth migration from a stressful one: prove the Noiz copy works before you change any public DNS. While your domain still points at the old host, you can preview the migrated site on Noiz privately.

• Use a hosts-file override. On your own computer, add a line to your hosts file mapping yourdomain.com to your Noiz server's IP address (shown in your Noiz welcome email and hosting panel). Your browser then loads the Noiz copy while the rest of the world still sees the old host. This is the cleanest way to test, because the site sees its real domain and nothing needs changing.
• Or use a temporary URL if your panel provides a preview address, remembering that a WordPress site with hard-coded URLs may not render perfectly under a different address.

Walk the whole site: home page, a few inner pages, a blog post, images, your menu, any contact form, and the login screen. Only when you are satisfied should you touch DNS.

Cut Over the Domain (DNS)

This is the actual "go live" moment. There are two ways to point your domain at Noiz, and which you use depends on where the domain is managed.

Option 1: Point the nameservers at Noiz

If Noiz will manage your DNS, set your domain's nameservers (at your domain registrar) to Noiz's hosting nameservers:

ns1.noiz.co.za
ns2.noiz.co.za

This hands all DNS for the domain to Noiz and is the simplest arrangement for a straightforward hosting move.

Option 2: Keep your DNS where it is, change one record

If you prefer to keep managing DNS at your current provider (or at Cloudflare), leave the nameservers alone and instead update the domain's A record to point at your Noiz server's IP address. This is the right choice if you have email, subdomains, or other services whose DNS records you do not want to move.

Do these two things around the cutover

• Lower the TTL first. A day before you switch, reduce the TTL on the record you are changing (to a few minutes if allowed). DNS changes are cached across the internet for the length of the TTL, so a low TTL makes the switch propagate quickly and a mistake quick to undo.
• Leave the old host running for a day or two after the switch. Because of caching, some visitors will still reach the old site during propagation. Keeping it live (and ideally read-only) means nobody hits a dead site, and nobody posts new content to a copy you are about to abandon.

Once DNS has settled on Noiz, issue or confirm the site's SSL certificate in your panel so the site loads over https, and check that http requests redirect to https.

Verify the Migration Worked

Do not declare victory until you have checked these, ideally a few hours after the DNS switch when propagation is well under way:

• Pages and posts load, including deep inner pages, not just the home page. Broken inner pages usually mean permalinks need re-saving.
• Images and media appear, and are being served from your domain, not the old host. View an image's address to confirm it points at Noiz.
• The login page works and you can reach the dashboard. If not, see the troubleshooting below.
• Forms, search, and any interactive features behave as they did before.
• No leftover old URLs. Search the live site for the old domain or old staging address; any hit means the URL update missed something.
• Caches are clear. Purge WordPress caching, your panel's cache, and any CDN, then hard-refresh. A surprising number of "it didn't migrate" reports are simply a cache serving the old page.

When everything checks out, and only then, cancel the old hosting. With the move complete, this is the ideal moment to harden the fresh installation; work through the WordPress Security Checklist before you move on.

Troubleshooting

• "Error establishing a database connection" after moving files. The database credentials in wp-config.php do not match the Noiz database. Recheck the name, user, password, and that DB_HOST is localhost. Confirm the SQL import actually completed and the tables exist in phpMyAdmin.
• The home page works but inner pages give a 404. The rewrite rules have not been rebuilt. Go to Settings > Permalinks and click Save Changes. On some servers you may also need the correct rewrite rules in the site's configuration; the Noiz support team can confirm these for your panel.
• You are redirected back to the old domain, or cannot reach the dashboard. The old address is still stored in the database. Update the siteurl and home values (via a serialisation-aware search-replace, or directly in phpMyAdmin) to the new domain, then clear caches.
• Images are missing or still load from the old host. For a content import, the "download and import file attachments" step did not run or timed out; re-run it, or copy the wp-content/uploads folder across by SFTP. For a full migration, confirm you uploaded the whole uploads folder and that URLs were updated.
• Widgets, theme options, or a page builder look broken after a domain change. This is serialised-data corruption from a raw find-and-replace. Restore your backup and redo the URL change with a serialisation-aware method only.
• You cannot log in on the new site. If the password was not carried across cleanly, or you are locked out after a domain change, reset it directly in the database: see how to reset a WordPress admin password via phpMyAdmin.
• The site still shows the old host days later. Either DNS has not propagated (check the record you changed and its TTL) or your local machine, browser, or a CDN is caching the old address. Test from a different network or device to be sure.

If you would rather not run the migration yourself, the Noiz support team can move your WordPress site onto Noiz hosting for you. Open a support ticket with your current host details (or WordPress.com login), your domain, and whether you want a content import or a full copy, and a technician will carry out the move, update the URLs safely, and confirm the result before the old site is retired. Managed-plan clients can request this as part of their plan.