Bluehost WordPress Migration: How to Move Your Site Away

Why People Move Off Bluehost

Bluehost attracts a large share of new WordPress site owners because introductory pricing is low — the Starter plan runs $3.99/month on a 36-month term as of May 2026, per Bluehost's published pricing. That changes at renewal. The same Starter plan renews at $9.99/month, and the Business plan renews at $13.99/month. These are prices listed on Bluehost's own pricing and renewal FAQ pages. The promotional period is typically the initial term you signed up for; after that, billing shifts to the renewal rate.

A second factor that comes up frequently in Bluehost migrations is backup frequency. Bluehost's standard shared hosting plans include weekly website backups — not daily. On a site that publishes content, processes orders, or collects form submissions regularly, losing a week of data is a meaningful risk. Bluehost does offer CodeGuard as a paid add-on for daily backups, but that is an additional cost on top of the hosting fee.

The third common reason is resource limits on shared hosting. Bluehost's standard plans run on shared infrastructure. Sites that are growing — seeing more traffic, running more plugins, or handling WooCommerce transactions — can encounter CPU throttling and slower response times on shared plans. Moving to hosting with dedicated resources or better-isolated infrastructure often produces measurable improvements, though the degree varies by site.

Bluehost Plan Pricing: Introductory vs. Renewal

These figures are taken from Bluehost's published pricing page and renewal FAQ, current as of May 2026. Prices are per month on a 36-month term.

Source: Bluehost pricing page and Bluehost renewal FAQ. Pricing may change; verify current rates on Bluehost's site before making decisions based on these figures.

Before You Start: What to Check

• Your domain situation. Bluehost includes a free domain for the first year on most plans. After the first year, the domain renews at Bluehost's standard domain registration rate. Check whether your domain is registered through Bluehost or through another registrar — this affects how you handle DNS during the migration.
• Domain lock. Domains are typically locked for 60 days after registration or transfer (ICANN policy). If your domain is in a lock period, you cannot transfer it to another registrar yet, but you can still change nameservers or the A record to point to a new host.
• Email hosting. Bluehost shared hosting plans include cPanel-based email (e.g., you@yourdomain.com hosted in Bluehost's cPanel). If you use this for email, migrating your hosting means migrating your email too — or switching to a dedicated email service (Google Workspace, Microsoft 365) and updating your MX records. Plan for this before you start.
• Current backup. Because Bluehost's standard plans do weekly backups, you may not have a very recent automatic backup. Before migrating, create a manual backup yourself using a plugin — do not rely on Bluehost's last automatic backup as your only copy. Instructions in Step 1 below.
• WordPress admin access. Confirm you can log into yourdomain.com/wp-admin before starting the migration.

Step 1: Create Your Own Backup with Duplicator

Install the free Duplicator plugin from wordpress.org. Do not rely on Bluehost's last weekly automatic backup as your migration source — create a fresh export right before you migrate.

1. In your WordPress dashboard, go to Plugins → Add New, search for "Duplicator", and install it.
2. Go to Duplicator → Packages → Create New.
3. Run the Duplicator wizard. It will scan your site and flag any warnings. Common on Bluehost: large uploads folders, and databases with many revisions. Proceed through any warnings unless you see an error.
4. When complete, download both files: the installer.php and the .zip archive. You need both. Store them somewhere safe (local computer, Google Drive, Dropbox).

For sites larger than 2–3 GB, the Duplicator archive can time out during creation on shared hosting. If this happens, use the manual method (export database via phpMyAdmin, zip files via cPanel) described in our complete WordPress migration guide.

Step 2: Set Up WordPress on Your New Host

Create an account with your new hosting provider and provision a WordPress installation. Most managed hosts do this automatically when you sign up. If you have access to a temporary URL or staging subdomain, use it — it lets you test the migrated site before making any DNS changes.

Note the database credentials your new host provides (database name, username, password, and host, usually localhost). You will need these when running the Duplicator installer.

Step 3: Upload and Run the Duplicator Installer

1. Connect to your new host via FTP/SFTP, or use the file manager in cPanel if your new host uses cPanel.
2. Upload both the installer.php and the .zip archive to your new host's web root directory — typically public_html/.
3. In a browser, go to http://your-temp-url/installer.php.
4. The Duplicator installer will walk you through entering the database credentials. Complete the setup wizard.
5. When the installation finishes, Duplicator will prompt you to log into WordPress and run a cleanup step. Do this — it removes leftover installer files.

Step 4: Test Everything Before Touching DNS

On your temporary URL, verify the following before making any DNS changes:

• WordPress admin login works and all content is present (posts, pages, images, menus).
• All plugins are active. Check for any plugin errors or warnings in the WordPress admin.
• Contact forms submit correctly and send email notifications.
• If you have WooCommerce, run through the checkout flow with a test transaction using a sandbox payment method.
• The site looks correct on mobile.
• SSL is provisioned by the new host. If not, check your hosting dashboard to activate it before the DNS cutover.

Step 5: Update DNS to Point to the New Host

How you do this depends on where your domain is registered.

If your domain is registered at Bluehost

Log into Bluehost, go to Domains, and select your domain. You can either:

• Update the nameservers to your new host's nameservers (your new host will provide these), or
• Update the A record in Bluehost's DNS Zone Editor to point to your new host's IP address.

Changing nameservers is simpler if you have no complex DNS configuration. Changing only the A record is better if you have other DNS records (MX records for email, subdomains, SPF/DKIM) that you want to leave in place at Bluehost temporarily.

If your domain is at another registrar

Log into that registrar and update the nameservers or A record to point to your new host. The process is the same regardless of which registrar holds the domain.

DNS propagation takes anywhere from a few minutes to 48 hours, depending on the TTL setting and how quickly your ISP refreshes its cache. During propagation, some visitors will see the old site and some the new one. Because the site exists at the same URL on both hosts with the same content, this is invisible to visitors.

Step 6: Cancel Bluehost Hosting

Wait until you have confirmed DNS has propagated and the new site is serving correctly before cancelling Bluehost. You can check propagation using a tool like whatsmydns.net — enter your domain and look for consistent results pointing to your new host's IP.

Log into Bluehost and cancel the hosting subscription — not the domain registration if you are keeping the domain there. Bluehost's cancellation process requires contacting support by phone or chat for some plan types. Check Bluehost's help documentation for the current process.

Note: If you received a free domain for the first year as part of your Bluehost plan, Bluehost may charge a domain fee if you cancel before the promotional period ends. Review your specific plan terms before cancelling.

Handling Email During the Migration

If you use cPanel email through Bluehost (mailboxes hosted on the same server as your website), you have two options:

• Move email to the new host's cPanel. Export your mailboxes from Bluehost's cPanel using the backup tool, set up the same email accounts on the new host, and update MX records to point to the new host.
• Switch to a dedicated email service. Services like Google Workspace ($6/user/month as of their published pricing) or Microsoft 365 Business Basic ($6/user/month) provide email that runs independently of your hosting. You update MX records to point to Google or Microsoft servers, and email continues working regardless of which hosting provider you use. This is the approach we recommend for businesses — it decouples email from hosting, so future hosting changes never touch email.

If email migration sounds complicated for your situation, book a free call — we handle this regularly and can walk through your specific setup.

Post-Migration Checklist

• Confirm HTTPS is working on all pages (no mixed-content warnings in the browser).
• Verify WordPress site URL settings: Settings → General — both the WordPress Address and Site Address should reflect your domain with HTTPS.
• Check Google Search Console for crawl errors a few days after migration.
• Confirm your sitemap is accessible at yourdomain.com/sitemap.xml (or wherever your SEO plugin places it).
• Set up and verify the backup schedule on your new host — confirm you know when backups run and how to restore.
• Delete the Duplicator installer.php file from your new host's root directory. Leaving it in place is a security risk.

Bluehost Migration FAQ

Is migrating from Bluehost free?

Yes. Our Bluehost migration service is free for new hosting customers — we move your files, database, and email with no migration fee and no downtime.

How do I migrate my WordPress site from Bluehost?

Create a full backup (the Duplicator plugin is the simplest), set up WordPress on the new host, restore the archive, test on a temporary URL, then repoint your DNS. Or let us handle the whole move for you — the steps are detailed in this guide.

Does Bluehost back up my site before I migrate?

Bluehost's standard plans back up weekly, not daily, so the most recent backup can be several days old. Before migrating we create a fresh, complete backup so your latest content, files, and database all move intact.