Time needed: 1 hour and 30 minutes

Here’s our guide on how to move from WP Engine.

1. Download all content from WP Engine.

   Start by downloading all your website content from WP Engine to your computer using SFTP. Unlike Servebolt, WP Engine does not support SSH so prepare to be patient while waiting for the SFTP transfer.

2. Download with backup point

   In WP Engines control panel you will find the backup point tab. From here you can request a backup. When the backup is done you can download a zip file of your backup. After a while you will get an email with an URL to download the zip file.
   
   The fastest method for uploading the zip file is by connecting with SSH on your Servebolt server. Navigate to your ~/public folder and run this command:
   
   wget [URL from email]
   
   Then when the download is complete, run this command to unzip the file.
   
   unzip [filename].zip

3. Import the database to Servebolt.

   WP Engine has a backup routine that exports the database of a website to the storage space of the website. When you downloaded the content of your website from WP Engine, you also downloaded the latest database backup.
   
   Here’s the location of the database:
   
   /wp-content/mysql.sql
   
   Last night’s backup is not always good enough. If you have an E-commerce site you would want to get a more recent copy, to not lose orders or other data. Using the Control Panel of Servebolt, select the site that the website should be imported to and go to the database settings.
   
   Use the link to phpMyAdmin and login with the database user and password (if you can’t remember the password, just set a new one in the database settings).
   In phpMyAdmin, select your database and click on the top tab named “Import”. In the “File to import”-field, select the database from your computer.
   
   Finally click on the “Run”-button on the bottom of the page. Now the import will run (this may take some time with larger databases, so don’t terminate/leave the page) and a confirmation will be displayed once its done.
   
   For larger databases it is easier to upload them to the server, and use the MySQL command via SSH.

4. Clean out the WP Engine files.

   Apart from the database export, WP Engine adds a lot of unnecessary files and folders to your website. There seem to be some differences among the folders/files, but here are the ones that we’ve found on pretty much every site we’ve moved. This folder with subfolders/files can be removed completely.
   
   /wp-content/mu-plugins
   
   These files can also all be removed:
   /wp-content/object-cache.php
/wp-content/mysql.sql
   
   Unless you’re using Git, these files are also not necessary.
   /.gitattributes
/.gitignore
   

5. Configure wp-config.php correctly.

   WP Engine often rewrites the WordPress config file wp-config.php completely. To set up the database connection with us, it’s better to use the sample-config file wp-config-sample.php. This way you’ll get a fast and clean installation.
   
   On your computer, rename wp-config.php to wp-config-old.php. Also rename wp-config-sample.php to wp-config.php and open this file in a text editor. Enter the values required for your database at Servebolt (database name, user and password). Don’t forget to save the changes!
   
   Also, be sure to set the unique salts and keys according to the instructions in the config file. For your own security!

6. Upload the files to your Servebolt site.

   Now all you need to do is to upload the previously downloaded files from your computer to Servebolt.
   
   Log in using your SFTP/SSH account with us and browse to the /public directory. If there’s a file named index.htm here, just remove it.
   
   Finally, upload all WordPress files to this directory. When the upload is complete, you should be able to visit your website using the URL listed in our control panel.
   
   That’s all there is to it! If you want we can move your WordPress and WooCommerce website for free to us.