Duplicator: WordPress Site Migration

Duplicator plugin helps to migrate a WordPress-powered website theme to another WordPress engine.

Plugins, pages, posts, images, users and all settings on an actively used website can be moved to another WordPress infrastructure with Duplicator.

Local WordPress will make your work much easier when moving your work to a domain.

It turns your existing website into a downloadable package.

There is no need to interfere with the database or the source code of the theme.

Using WordPress Duplicator

Install and activate the Duplicator plugin from the plugin installation area in the WordPress panel.

After the Duplicator plugin is activated, its icon appears on the left bar of the panel.

When logging into the Duplicator plugin page, the following screen opens. It gives a “package not found” warning because no package has been created yet.

We start creating the first theme package with the “Create New” button in the upper right area.

After clicking the button, a page opens where we can configure 3 sections: “Storage”, “Archive” and “Installer”.

The package name comes automatically as the date the package was created and the name of the website, it can be changed as desired.

It shows the information in which directory the package will be added by default in the Storage area and the possibility to backup in cloud systems such as Amazon, Dropbox, Google Drive, which can be used in the Duplicator Pro version.

The configuration area of ​​the package files to be compressed and saved in the Archive area is opened.

This field can be skipped without any additional editing.

During the next installation, a password can be set for the package prepared in the Installer area for security purposes, or the database information from which the data will be extracted can be entered.

In the Pro version, Cpanel account can be connected.

Since the operations in this area are not necessary but optional, they can be continued without making any adjustments.

After clicking the “Next” button, if the plugin scans for a while and the metrics give the “Good” value in the evaluation at the end of the scan, the “Build” button can be clicked to proceed to the next stage.

The package preparation process may take longer depending on the content and load on the site.

After the package is prepared, a compressed (.zip) file containing the installation initiator, installer.php and the content of the website is created. You can download these files separately with the “Installer” and “Archive” buttons, or you can download them at once with the “One-Click Download” option.

Prepared Packages

You can view and download the packages you have created before by clicking the “Packages” heading under the Duplicator tab.

Installing Packages on a Different WordPress Engine

Add the downloaded installer.php and .zip files to the root directory of the other WordPress engine where the package will be installed (the directory where the wp-content, wp-admin, wp-includes, wp-config… files are located).

Open the browser and add installer.php to the end of the home page URL.

For example, if the URL of the site you added the installation files to is abc.com, type abc.com/installer.php in the browser’s search bar to start the installation.

On the page that opens, checks such as MySQL, PHP version compatibility are made and if it is compatible, it gives the “Pass” value for the metrics.

Note: This process will overwrite existing WordPress files and your previous files will be lost, make a backup of your files before proceeding!

At the bottom of the page;

When you tick the,

Continue with site overwrite mode (required to continue)

and

I have read and accept all terms & notices (required to continue) boxes, the “Next” button becomes active. Click the button and go to the next step.

In the second step, the database test page comes, check the database connection with the “Test Database” button.

In the third stage, you can optionally update data depending on your preference. It is generally maintained without any change.

In this example, the installation is performed on the WordPress infrastructure on localhost.

Click the “Next” button to proceed to the final stage.

In the fourth stage, a link button appears stating that we need to log in from the admin page. Click the button and login.

Installer.php and .zip files are automatically deleted when logged in.

With the screen above showing that the files have been deleted, the Duplicator site migration process ends.