Migrate Your Website from Shared Hosting to VPS: A Step-by-Step Guide

For their first website, people usually go with shared website hosting. It’s affordable and easy to manage, making it more than suitable for beginners and users with minimal technical knowledge. However, as the website and its traffic volume grow, the required server resources, such as storage space and bandwidth, will also increase.

One of the most effective ways to scale up is to migrate your website from shared hosting to VPS for better performance, compatibility, and security. This tutorial will explain the steps to migrate from shared hosting to VPS. But first, let’s explore what VPS hosting is and why it can be an ideal upgrade from your shared account.

A brief overview of migrating a website from shared hosting to VPS:

Why you need VPS hosting
How to migrate your website from shared hosting to VPS

Why you need VPS hosting

A virtual private server (VPS) is one of the most popular hosting services for large websites and projects. Comparing VPS and shared hosting services, both divide a physical server for multiple users. However, a VPS platform uses virtualization technology like a hypervisor to divide the server into partitions, providing each user with isolated, dedicated resources.

Here are the advantages of switching from a shared plan to a VPS hosting environment:

Server resources: a VPS hosting plan offers higher CPU, RAM, and storage space resources than shared hosting, increasing speed and scaling your site for higher traffic volumes.
Dedicated server space: unlike shared web hosting, VPS gives users their own dedicated server space for their website or project. This improves privacy for better data security.
System management: VPS hosting services give users root access and a dedicated IP address, giving them complete control of the server technology. For instance, they can install software and operating systems (OS) freely.
Self-healing environment: VPS can deploy an automatic failover during misconfiguration or system failure. It also uses a cloud platform that constantly customizes and reconfigures resources, which dedicated servers lack.
Privacy and security: with shared hosting services, security issues on one server may affect all the hosted sites. VPS partitions prevent this risk.

If you need hosting scalability and full control over the server, upgrade from a shared to a VPS plan. It’s more affordable than a dedicated server and offers additional features.

How to migrate your website from shared hosting to VPS

Now, let’s go over the process of migrating your website from shared hosting to VPS, ensuring a smooth transition to increased performance and control.

1. Create a site backup

Before modifying a site, make sure to create a WordPress backup to avoid data loss in case of errors or misconfigurations. Doing so also lets you transfer your site files and databases to another hosting type and provider easily.

Here are the steps to create a backup:

Open your hosting account’s control panel and navigate to Files → Backups.
Select Files backups and check the time and date of the latest backup from the drop-down menu. Click Next step.
Press Download all files and wait until the process is finished.
Once the Download Backup button appears, right-click and select Copy Link Address.
Paste the link into a text editor. We will use this download link to migrate your website files.
Repeat the steps for your database by clicking Database backups. If there are no backups available, select Generate new backup → Proceed. Copy the backup download link and database name to a text editor.

2. Set up a virtual private server

Before migrating your site, set up the VPS first. Choose a server template with the Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP (LAMP) stack and Webmin/Virtualmin pre-installed. Servers with a pre-installed control panel make management easier.

Here’s how to set up the VPS:

Go to your hosting account’s control panel and select the VPS tab. Choose the VPS you want to set up and click Operating System on the sidebar.
Select an OS with Control Panel, choose your desired template, and click Change OS.
Wait for the new server to start. Access Webmin or Virtualmin with root access permissions using the provided login URL and credentials.
Configure Virtualmin according to your needs, such as enabling or disabling features like virus scanning and spam filtering.
Create a new user, database, and directory for your website using Virtualmin.

3. Transfer website files to the VPS

Once the new server is set, transfer your site files from shared hosting to VPS. Here’s how:

Connect to your new VPS account via an SSH client or use the browser terminal from the control panel.
Access the directory where you will store all your files.
Copy your website file backup’s download link.
Use the wget command to download the backup from your shared server to the VPS.
Extract the archive using the tar command.
Move the contents of the extracted folder to the public_html folder created with Virtualmin.
Change the files and folders’ ownership to match the credentials from Virtualmin.

4. Transfer database files to the virtual private server

To transfer the database backup from your shared hosting account to the VPS, follow these steps:

Obtain the MySQL database name, username, and password from Virtualmin.
Download and extract the MySQL database backup from your shared hosting account.
Import the MySQL backup to the new database in your VPS using the mysql command.

5. Make some final changes

After completing the website and MySQL database import process, you may need to make additional VPS configurations. Update the wp-config.php file with the new MySQL database details, and update the DNS record to point the domain name to the VPS.

Lastly, check if your website is functioning properly and make any necessary changes to ensure its optimal performance on the VPS.

By following these steps, you can successfully migrate your website from shared hosting to VPS. Enjoy the increased performance and control that VPS hosting provides!

Migrate your website from shared hosting to VPS FAQ

In this section, we will answer several commonly asked questions about migrating from shared hosting to VPS to help you understand it more.

What is the difference between shared hosting and VPS hosting?

In a shared hosting environment, multiple users share the same server resources, meaning your website may slow down when others experience high traffic. VPS hosting provides users with isolated resources from a virtual server partition, providing better performance and customization.

Can I migrate a non-WordPress website from shared hosting to VPS?

Yes, you can migrate custom-coded websites or ones built on any content management system (CMS) to VPS hosting plans. However, you may not be able to migrate websites built using a website builder since they are tied to a specific hosting provider.

Is VPS hosting faster than shared hosting?

Yes, VPS hosting provides isolated server resources to ensure your website performs well, even during high traffic. You can also tailor the server environment and resource allocations according to your needs to ensure optimal website performance.

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