How to migrate a website without losing search traffic

Good website migration SEO protects your search traffic in five steps. To migrate a website without losing that traffic, record every current page and how it performs, redirect each old address to its closest new page with permanent redirects, keep the titles, content and structured data that search engines rely on, check everything on launch day, and monitor closely in the weeks after. Traffic losses after a migration often trace back to missing redirects or lost content rather than to the move itself, and a careful plan prevents both.

A website migration is any big change to a site's addresses or structure: a new domain, a move to HTTPS, a new platform, or a redesign that changes page addresses. Search engines have learned where your pages are and what they contain, and the goal is to help them transfer that knowledge to the new site. If you would like help planning a move, our SEO service page explains how we work.

Website migration SEO starts with recording your current pages

You cannot protect what you have not recorded. Before anything changes, take a complete snapshot of the current site.

1. List every page address. Use a crawler (a tool that follows links through your site like a search engine does), your XML sitemap and your content management system's page list. Combine them, because each may miss some pages.
2. Record which pages bring visitors. Export page-level data from your analytics tool and from Google Search Console, the free tool where Google reports how your site appears in search. Note the pages with the most clicks.
3. Record the search terms that matter. Note the queries each important page appears for, so you can check them after the move.
4. Save titles, descriptions and headings. Export the title tag, meta description and main heading of every page.
5. Find pages with links from other websites. Links from other sites carry value. Those pages need especially careful redirects.
6. Keep a copy of the old site. A full backup or a crawl export lets you check old content later.

Store all of this in one spreadsheet. It becomes the foundation for every later step.

Building a redirect map

A redirect automatically sends visitors and search engines from an old address to a new one. A redirect map is a list of every old address and where it should go.

Google's guide to site moves with URL changes recommends permanent redirects, such as 301 or 308, and keeping them in place for as long as possible, generally for at least a year.

1. Map every old page to its closest new page. A product should redirect to the same product, a service page to the same service. Relevance matters.
2. Avoid sending everything to the home page. Redirecting many unrelated pages to the home page confuses visitors and loses the value of each page.
3. Handle pages that no longer exist. If there is no equivalent, choose the closest relevant page, such as the parent category. Where nothing fits, it can be acceptable to let the page return a "not found" response.
4. Avoid redirect chains. Each old address should go straight to its final new address, not through several steps.
5. Include variations. Old addresses with and without www, with http and https, and with trailing slashes should all reach the right new page.
6. Test the map before launch. On the staging site, check a large sample of old addresses and confirm each lands on the right page.

Setting up the redirects

How redirects are added depends on your hosting and platform. They can be set in the web server configuration, in the application code, or with a redirect plugin in a content management system. Each works, but a few points apply everywhere:

1. Use patterns where addresses follow a rule. If every blog post moved from one folder to another, a single pattern can redirect them all, with individual rules only for exceptions.
2. Keep the map in one place. Scattered rules across several tools are hard to check and easy to break during later changes.
3. Keep query strings in mind. Campaign links often carry extra parameters. Check that redirects keep them where needed, so tracking still works.
4. Document the setup. Record where the redirects live and who can change them, so they are not removed by accident in a future update.

Travel sites with route and hotel pages need particular care here, as our guide to travel website SEO explains.

Keeping titles, content and structured data

Search engines rank pages based largely on what they contain. If a redesign removes content or changes page focus, rankings can drop even with perfect redirects.

1. Keep important content. Pages that bring traffic should keep their main text, not be cut to a short summary for the new design.
2. Keep or improve titles and descriptions. Carry over the title tags and meta descriptions from your snapshot, updating only where you have a clear reason.
3. Keep heading structure. Each page should still have one clear main heading that matches its topic.
4. Carry over structured data. Structured data is code that describes your content to search engines, such as products, articles or your organisation. Make sure it exists on the new pages and still validates.
5. Update internal links. Links within your site should point directly to new addresses, not rely on redirects. Google's guide also recommends this.
6. Check canonical tags. A canonical tag tells search engines which address is the main version of a page. On the new site, each should point to the new address, never the old one.
7. Keep images and their descriptions. Image file names and alternative text help image search and accessibility.

Online stores should also check that filters and variants have not created new duplicate pages, and our guide to fixing ecommerce duplicate content explains how.

Launch day checks

Launch day is when small mistakes become visible to search engines. Work through a checklist rather than relying on memory.

1. Remove any block on search engines. Staging sites are often blocked from indexing. Make sure the live site is not, by checking the robots.txt file and page-level settings.
2. Switch on the redirects and test a sample of old addresses straight away, including the most important pages from your snapshot.
3. Submit the new XML sitemap in Google Search Console, as Google's guide recommends, so it learns about the new addresses.
4. Use the Change of Address tool only if the domain changed. Google's guide explains that this tool is needed when moving from one domain or subdomain to another, not for a move to HTTPS or a redesign on the same domain.
5. Check tracking. Confirm analytics and any conversion tracking work on the new site.
6. Crawl the new site. Look for broken links, missing titles, pages blocked by mistake and redirects that loop or chain.

Choose a launch time when your team can react quickly, not late on a Friday or before a holiday.

Monitoring in the weeks after

Google notes that rankings may fluctuate while a changed site is recrawled and reindexed. Monitoring lets you tell normal settling from real problems.

1. Watch Search Console. Check indexing reports, crawl errors and pages reported as not found. Fix missing redirects as they appear.
2. Compare with your snapshot. Check clicks and positions for your most important pages and search terms against the records you made before the move.
3. Check the old sitemap addresses. Crawl the list of old addresses regularly to confirm they still redirect correctly.
4. Watch analytics by page. A sudden drop on specific pages usually points to a missing redirect, lost content or a technical block.
5. Update links you control. Change links on social profiles, business listings, email signatures and ads to the new addresses.
6. Ask for important external links to be updated. Where you have a relationship with a site that links to you, ask them to use the new address.

Keep the redirects in place long after the migration. Removing them early can lose both visitors and the value of links pointing to old addresses.

When traffic does not recover

If traffic to important pages stays low after the site has had time to settle, investigate page by page rather than assuming the whole migration failed.

1. Check the redirect for each affected page. A missing, chained or wrong redirect is the most common cause.
2. Compare old and new content. Look for text, headings or internal links that were removed in the redesign.
3. Check indexing. Use Search Console's URL Inspection tool to see whether the new page is indexed and which address Google treats as the main version.
4. Look for technical blocks. A leftover block from staging, a wrong canonical tag or a slow page can all hold a page back.
5. Fix and record. Correct the problem, note the date, and compare results in the following weeks.

Summary

• Record every page, its traffic, search terms, titles and external links before changing anything.
• Build a page-by-page redirect map with permanent redirects, and avoid redirecting everything to the home page.
• Keep important content, titles, headings, structured data and canonical tags on the new pages.
• On launch day, remove indexing blocks, test redirects, submit the new sitemap and crawl the site.
• Monitor Search Console and compare with your snapshot in the weeks after, and keep redirects in place.

A migration handled carefully lets a new site keep the search visibility the old one earned. If you're planning a redesign, a new platform or a domain change, you can tell us about it here.