Most WordPress migration plugins work fine right up to the moment they don’t, and the failure is almost always the same: the archive is bigger than the new host will accept, the upload dies at 90%, and you are left with a half-imported database and a site that won’t load. Picking the right tool is mostly about matching your site’s size and your host’s limits before you start. Here is what each one actually costs and where each one falls over.
Quick verdict
- Best overall: Duplicator, on compatibility. It is the one that still works when the destination host fights you, and the free version handles most single-site moves on its own.
- Best free: Migrate Guru. It is the only tool here that pushes a site host-to-host with no paid tier at all, and it does the heavy lifting on its own servers instead of yours.
- Skip it if: you are moving from localhost or into a multisite subsite. Migrate Guru needs to reach both ends over the public internet, so it cannot do either.
- Our call: for the common case, a live site moving to a new host, install Migrate Guru first. If both ends are reachable you are done in an hour for nothing. Fall back to Duplicator when it cannot be, and buy Duplicator Pro only when you migrate sites for a living.
The best WordPress migration plugins in 2026, compared
| Plugin | What the free version moves | Paid entry (list) | Renews at | Sites |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Duplicator | Full site archive plus installer, manual upload | $79/yr (Basic) | Full list price | 2 |
| Migrate Guru | Full host-to-host push, sites up to 200 GB | No paid tier | n/a | Unlimited |
| All-in-One WP Migration | Export and import file, capped by your host’s PHP upload limit | $69/yr (Unlimited Extension), $99/yr (Pro) | Same price | Up to 50 |
| UpdraftPlus | Backup, download, upload and restore with search-replace | 84.00/yr incl. UK VAT (Personal) | Not stated on the pricing page | 2 |
| WPvivid | Backup plus migration by uploading the archive | $49/yr or $99 lifetime | $49/yr | 2 |
| WP Migrate Lite | Database export with find-and-replace, plus a full ZIP export | $49/yr intro, lists at $99 | $99/yr list | 1 |
| WP BackItUp | Closed on WordPress.org since 20 August 2026 | $79/yr (Personal) | $79/yr | 1 |
Two numbers from that table are worth pausing on. The lowest US dollar annual list price here is WPvivid at $49 a year, and WPvivid is also the only tool still selling a genuine lifetime licence at $99. Everything else that used to be a one-off purchase has moved to a subscription, which is the single biggest change since the last time this article was accurate.
Duplicator
Duplicator packages your site into an archive plus a small installer script, and you drop both onto the new server. That design is why it works almost anywhere, including hosts that block the clever stuff. It is on 1 million or more active installs with a 4.9 rating on its WordPress.org listing, currently at version 1.5.17.
The free version is more capable than most people expect. You can build a full archive, move it, and run the installer without paying anything. Where Pro earns its keep is repetition: scheduled backups, multisite, cloud destinations, recovery points, and a direct server-to-server transfer that skips the download-and-reupload dance entirely.
Key features
- Single-archive packaging with a guided installer, so no manual database import
- Drag-and-drop import over an existing WordPress install
- Direct server-to-server transfer and recovery points (Pro)
- Multisite backup and migration (Pro)
- Documented support for managed hosts including WP Engine and GoDaddy Managed
Price: free on WordPress.org. Pro lists at $79 for 2 sites, $199 for 5, $399 for 20 and $599 for the 100-site bundle on the Duplicator pricing page. The page was running an introductory discount at the check date and states plainly that all renewals are at full price, so budget the list figures above, not the sale ones.
Best for: anyone who moves more than one site a year, and anyone whose destination host is restrictive enough that automated tools fail.
Skip it if: you want a one-click push and your host is on Migrate Guru’s supported list. Duplicator asks more of you, and on a shared plan with a low PHP time limit the archive build itself can time out on a large site.
Migrate Guru
Migrate Guru comes from the BlogVault team and takes the opposite approach to everything else here: the transfer runs on their infrastructure, not on your struggling shared host. You give it destination credentials, it copies the site across, rewrites URLs and handles serialized data on the way. It is at 200,000 or more active installs with a 4.9 rating on its WordPress.org listing, and the vendor states support for sites up to 200 GB.
Offloading the work is the whole point. PHP timeouts, memory exhaustion and upload caps are the three things that kill migrations, and none of them apply when your server is only reading files rather than zipping and uploading them.
Key features
- One-click migration with the transfer handled off your server
- Automatic URL rewriting and serialized-data handling
- Multisite moves with no separate add-on
- Works across hosts rather than locking you to one
- Email alerts when a transfer finishes or fails
Price: free, with no paid tier. That is unusual enough to be suspicious of, so the honest framing is that it exists to introduce you to BlogVault and MalCare, which are paid products from the same company.
Best for: a live-to-live host move, especially a large one. If you are working out where to land, our guide to choosing a WordPress host is a better place to start than a plugin comparison.
Skip it if: the source site is on localhost, behind HTTP auth, or on an internal network. Migrate Guru has to reach both ends from the outside. It also cannot drop a standalone site into an existing multisite network as a subsite.
All-in-One WP Migration
This is the plugin your client already installed before calling you. Export produces one file, import takes one file, and there is nothing else to understand. It is the most-installed tool in this roundup at 5 million or more active installs, rated 4.5 on its WordPress.org listing and currently at version 7.110.
The upload limit is the thing everyone hits, and it is also the thing every roundup gets wrong, so here it is plainly. The current plugin sets no maximum file size of its own; there is no such constant in its code as of version 7.110. The number the import screen shows you is your server’s own upload_max_filesize and post_max_size, read back and displayed. On budget shared hosting that is frequently 64 MB, which is why a 300 MB export refuses to import. The old claim that the free version caps you at 512 MB is simply out of date.
You have two ways out. Raise the PHP limits yourself, which is the same territory as increasing the WordPress memory limit and is free if your host lets you edit those values. Or buy the Unlimited Extension, which overrides them for you.
Key features
- Export to a single file, import by uploading it, with automatic URL replacement
- No host or operating system requirements worth speaking of
- Selective export, so you can leave out spam comments or a bloated log table
- Cloud storage extensions for Google Drive, Dropbox, S3 and others
- Chunked transfer, which survives flaky connections better than a single POST
Price: free on WordPress.org. The Unlimited Extension is $69 a year for up to 50 sites, and All-in-One WP Migration Pro is $99 a year for the same site count with automation and cloud storage included. Note that this used to be a lifetime purchase and no longer is, so if you bought it years ago on that basis, check what you are actually renewing.
Best for: small and mid-sized sites, and handing to a non-technical client who needs to send you a copy of their site without touching FTP.
Skip it if: your export is comfortably larger than your destination host’s upload cap and you cannot change that cap. Paying $69 a year to work around a server setting is a poor trade when Migrate Guru sidesteps the problem for nothing.
UpdraftPlus
UpdraftPlus is a backup plugin that migrates as a side effect, and for a lot of people that is the right shape. It sits on 3 million or more active installs with a 4.8 rating on its WordPress.org listing, currently version 1.26.7. The free version genuinely does move a site: back up, download, upload to the new install, restore, and the built-in search-and-replace fixes the URLs.
The product has moved under the TeamUpdraft brand and the old standalone Migrator add-on no longer appears as a separately priced item. Migration now sits inside Premium. If you were expecting to buy Migrator for a small one-off fee, that route has closed.
Key features
- Scheduled backups to Dropbox, Google Drive, OneDrive, S3, Azure and more
- Search-and-replace on restore, so a domain change does not break links
- WP-CLI support and multisite compatibility
- Database encryption and incremental backups on Premium
- Backs up non-WordPress files and databases alongside the site
Price: free core plugin. The UpdraftPlus pricing page served 84.00 per year including UK VAT for Personal (2 sites) at the check date, rising through Business, Agency and Enterprise. The page has a currency switcher and changes by region, and it does not state a renewal price, so confirm your own total at checkout.
Best for: people who wanted a backup routine anyway. If that is you, compare it properly against the field in our roundup of WordPress backup plugins before deciding.
Skip it if: migration is a one-time job. Paying for a backup suite to perform a single move is the expensive way round, and the free version already does that move.
WPvivid Backup and Migration
WPvivid is the quiet one, at 900,000 or more active installs and a 4.9 rating on its WordPress.org listing. Its selling point is that migration by upload is in the free plugin rather than fenced off, and the free tier also does image optimisation and a staging-style clone. The auto-migration feature, where you paste a key from the destination site and it pulls the data across, is Pro.
Key features
- Free migration by uploading a backup to the destination install
- Key-based auto-migration between two sites on Pro
- Scheduled backups to a dozen remote storage providers
- Split archives, which is the practical answer to a low upload cap
Price: free plugin. The WPvivid pricing page lists Pro from $49 a year for 2 domains, or $99 as a one-time lifetime licence for the same tier, up to $149 a year and $299 lifetime for unlimited domains. As noted above, $49 is the lowest US dollar annual list price in this comparison.
Best for: anyone allergic to subscriptions. The lifetime option is a real one and it is priced sensibly.
Skip it if: you need the largest possible ecosystem of documentation and third-party tutorials. Fewer people use it, so when something odd happens you are more reliant on the vendor’s own support.
WP Migrate
WP Migrate, formerly WP Migrate DB Pro and now part of WP Engine’s stable after the Delicious Brains acquisition, is a different animal. It is built for developers who sync a database between environments several times a week, not for people relocating a blog once. The find-and-replace on serialized data is the best in this list, and it is the reason the plugin has survived.
WP Migrate Lite is on 200,000 or more active installs with a 4.2 rating on its WordPress.org listing. That is the lowest rating of any open listing in this roundup, and the reviews explain why: the free version cannot push or pull between two live sites, which is what most people assume they are downloading.
Key features
- Push and pull the database directly between two installs (paid)
- Reliable find-and-replace across serialized options and metadata
- WP-CLI integration for scripted deploys
- Saved migration profiles for repeat syncs
- Media, theme and plugin file transfer on the higher tiers
Price: the WP Migrate pricing page showed Basic at $49 a year for 1 site against a struck-through $99, Standard at $99 for 2, Plus at $189 for 3 and Premier at $219 for unlimited sites. Those are introductory figures; the list prices behind them are $99, $149, $249 and $299.
Best for: agencies running local, staging and production copies of the same site, where the database moves constantly and the files rarely do.
Skip it if: you are doing one host move. You would be paying developer-tool prices for a job Migrate Guru does free.
WP BackItUp: skip this one for now
WP BackItUp used to earn a place on lists like this. It no longer does, and the reason is not a matter of opinion. Its WordPress.org listing carries a notice that the plugin was closed on 20 August 2026 and is not available for download, pending a full review. The last release was version 2.1.0.
The vendor still sells licences at $79, $99 and $199 a year for 1, 5 and 20 sites. We are leaving the entry here rather than deleting it because plenty of sites still have it installed, and those owners deserve to know. A closure is usually temporary and often ends in a fixed release, but a plugin you cannot install from the repository is not one to start a migration with this week. Check the listing again before you commit either way.
What most migration roundups get wrong
Three things, consistently.
The size limit is your host, not the plugin. The 512 MB figure attached to All-in-One WP Migration has been copied between articles for years. It describes an old constant that is not in the current code. What actually stops your import is your destination server’s PHP configuration, and the fix is either a config change or a licence, depending on how much control your host gives you. Knowing which one you are dealing with takes thirty seconds and saves $69.
Intro prices are quoted as if they were the price. Duplicator’s own page says it in as many words: introductory pricing, all renewals at full price. WP Migrate’s $49 Basic sits next to a struck-through $99. If you are buying a tool you will keep, the number that matters is year two, and for most of these it is meaningfully higher than the one on the banner.
Download counts get quoted instead of installs. A cumulative download total is a marketing number that only goes up, including every update anyone ever ran. Active installs is the figure WordPress.org publishes and the one worth comparing. Where those two get mixed together you end up with claims like thirty million users for a plugin with one million active installs.
What actually breaks after the move
The migration is the easy half. Work through this before you point DNS at the new server, and again after it propagates.
- Media thumbnails. Open the media library. If thumbnails are broken but full-size images load, the search-and-replace missed a serialized value. That is the canary for everything else.
- Cache configuration. Caching plugins write absolute paths into config files and sometimes into wp-config.php. Clear and regenerate rather than trusting the imported settings. If you run WP Rocket, deactivate it before the export and reactivate after, or compare notes against our WordPress cache plugins guide if you are switching.
- File permissions. An archive extracted as the wrong user leaves wp-content/uploads unwritable. You find out the next time someone uploads an image.
- Licence keys. Premium themes and plugins bind licences to a domain. Deactivate on the old domain first if you are changing domains, or you will burn an activation slot.
- Security and login hardening. Firewall rules and IP allowlists do not travel. Re-check them against our list of WordPress security plugins once the new site is live.
- Verification step: load the new site by editing your local hosts file to point the domain at the new server’s IP before changing DNS. Click through ten real URLs, submit a form, and complete a checkout if you have one. Only then change the nameservers.
After the cutover, watch response times for a week. A new host is not automatically a faster one, and the fixes for a slow origin are the same wherever you are hosted, covered in our guides to reducing server response time and speeding up a WordPress site. Keep the old server alive for at least a fortnight; it costs one month of hosting and it is the only real undo button you have.
Which one should you install?
- Live site to a new live host, any size: Migrate Guru. Free, and it removes the failure modes rather than working around them.
- Localhost or staging to live: Duplicator free, or All-in-One WP Migration if the archive fits under your upload cap.
- You move sites for clients regularly: Duplicator Pro at $79 a year for 2 sites, or the higher tiers if you run more.
- You sync databases between environments: WP Migrate. Nothing else here is built for that rhythm.
- You want to pay once: WPvivid at $99 lifetime for 2 domains.
- You would rather not do this yourself: many hosts migrate for free as a signup incentive, and it is worth comparing that against a plugin. Our roundups of WordPress hosting platforms and cheap WordPress hosting note who does. Failing that, WordPress maintenance services will handle it.
One more thing to schedule for the week after: re-run your on-page checks. Redirects and canonical tags are the two that quietly go wrong on a domain change, and our walkthrough of optimising posts for SEO in WordPress covers what to look at.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does All-in-One WP Migration have a file size limit in the free version?
Not one the plugin sets. Current versions define no maximum upload constant of their own; the figure you see is your host reading back upload_max_filesize and post_max_size. Shared hosting often caps that around 64 MB. Raise the PHP limits yourself, or buy the Unlimited Extension to override them.
Which migration plugin is free and still moves a large site?
Migrate Guru. It runs the transfer on its own servers rather than yours, states support for sites up to 200 GB, and has no paid tier. The trade-off is that it only moves one live host to another, so localhost jobs and multisite subsite imports need a different tool.
Do I need a paid plugin to move a small WordPress site?
No. A site under a few hundred megabytes moves fine on Duplicator free, WPvivid free or All-in-One WP Migration free. Paid tiers buy scheduling, direct server-to-server pushes, multisite support and bigger archives. They do not produce a better result on a small, straightforward move.
Will migrating hurt my search rankings?
Only if the URLs change or the site breaks. Keep the permalink structure identical, redirect anything that genuinely moved, resubmit the sitemap, and watch Search Console for crawl errors for a fortnight. A host move that keeps every URL the same is usually invisible to Google.
How long should a WordPress migration take?
For a small blog, roughly twenty minutes plus DNS propagation. For a 10 GB store, plan half a day including testing. DNS is the slow part, so lower your TTL to 300 seconds a day before you cut over and the switch lands in minutes rather than hours.
What breaks most often after a migration?
Hardcoded URLs inside serialized options, cache plugin config pointing at the old path, unwritable permissions on wp-content/uploads, and licence keys bound to the old domain. Check media library thumbnails first. If those are broken, the search-and-replace missed something and other things will be wrong too.
Can I migrate from localhost to a live server?
Yes, using Duplicator, All-in-One WP Migration or WPvivid, all of which package the local site into an archive you upload to the destination. Migrate Guru cannot do this, because it needs to reach both the source and the destination over the public internet.
Should I keep the migration plugin installed afterwards?
No. Deactivate and delete it once the new site is verified. Migration plugins leave large archive files sitting in wp-content, and an abandoned installer script left on a public server is a well-known route to a compromised site. Backups are a separate job with separate tools.
Is the UpdraftPlus Migrator add-on still sold separately?
At the check date the UpdraftPlus pricing page listed migration as part of Premium rather than as a standalone Migrator product with its own price. If migration is all you want, single-purpose tools are cheaper, and the free UpdraftPlus plugin already moves a site by download and restore.
Our call
Install Migrate Guru. For the specific job most people arrive here with, moving a live WordPress site from one host to another, it is free, it does not care how big the site is, and it removes the three failure modes that ruin migrations instead of asking you to route around them. There is no paid tier to upsell you to, which is unusual and worth taking advantage of.
If Migrate Guru cannot see both ends, because you are coming off localhost or dropping a site into a multisite network, use Duplicator free. If you do this often enough that scheduling and server-to-server transfer would save you real hours, Duplicator Pro at $79 a year for two sites is the honest upgrade. If subscriptions are the sticking point, WPvivid at $99 lifetime is the only remaining one-off purchase in this comparison.
Whichever you choose, take a full backup with something other than the plugin doing the migrating, and keep the old server running for two weeks. Then delete the migration plugin the moment the new site checks out. It has done its job, and leaving it in place is a liability rather than an insurance policy.
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