How to Move Your Website to a New Host Without Downtime

Switching hosts sounds risky, and most people put it off for exactly that reason. The good news is that a careful migration doesn't need any downtime at all. Your old site keeps serving visitors until the new one is ready, and the switch itself takes a single DNS change.

Here is the process we follow for our own customers, step by step.

1. Take stock before you touch anything

Make a short list of everything that lives on your current hosting account:

• Websites and their domains (including subdomains)
• Databases (WordPress, shops and most CMSs use MySQL/MariaDB)
• Email accounts, forwarders and autoresponders
• Cron jobs, custom PHP settings and SSL certificates

Also note where your domain's DNS is managed. It may be at your registrar, your old host or a service like Cloudflare. That's where you'll make the final switch.

2. Lower your DNS TTL a day in advance

TTL (time to live) tells resolvers how long to cache your DNS records. If it's set to 24 hours, some visitors could keep reaching the old server for a full day after you switch. Lower the TTL of your A and MX records to 300 seconds about 24 hours before the move, and the final cut-over will spread in minutes instead of hours.

3. Copy everything to the new server

If both hosts use cPanel, a full cPanel backup restores files, databases, email and settings in one go. Otherwise, copy the files over SFTP, export and import the database, and recreate the mailboxes.

Never send passwords in plain text over email or chat. Create a temporary FTP or cPanel user for the migration and delete it when you're done.

4. Test the new copy before anyone sees it

You can preview the site on the new server without changing DNS by editing your computer's hosts file so your domain points to the new IP address. Click through the important pages, submit a form, log in to the admin panel and, for a store, run a test order.

5. Switch DNS and keep the old host running

When everything checks out, update the DNS records (or the nameservers) to point to the new host. Because the TTL is low, most visitors move over within minutes. Keep the old hosting active for at least 48 hours so any stragglers still reach a working site, and so no email gets lost.

6. Final checks

• Confirm the SSL certificate has been issued on the new server.
• Send and receive a test email from each important mailbox.
• Check Google Search Console for crawl errors over the next few days.
• Set the TTL back to a normal value, such as 3600 seconds.

Prefer to have it done for you?

Every OrienHost plan includes free migration. Our team copies your sites, databases and email, tests everything on the new server and coordinates the DNS switch with you, while your current site stays online the whole time. Open a ticket from your client area, or pick a plan and mention that you'd like a migration.