How do I move from one cPanel host to another?

How do I move my sites from my old host to you?

If your old host is using cPanel you are in luck! If they aren't, the only way to move your site is by uploading and downloading it all manually using a tool such as FTP .

Steps to backup and move your site

1. First login to your cpanel and click "backup" (make sure you are using x skin)

2. Once in backup click "download a home directory backup" This will backup all your email accounts, files, and a few other things. It will not backup your MySQL databases.

3. If you have any MySQL databases you will download them now.

4. If you have any Aliases/Filter Backups download them.

5. Congratsulations, you have backed up your entire site, and it's now time to restore it.

6. Login to your cpanel with us click "backup"

7. Under "Restore a Home Backup," click "Browse" and find the home backup you have you have already downloaded, and click upload.

8. Do the same for your MySQL databases.

9. Do the same for your Aliases/Filters.

10. You are done with everything your site has been restored, now repeat this process for any more sites you wish to backup.

Getting your database to work after restoring it

After you have restored your database, you will get an error when trying to view it's page.

Example Error:

Warning: mysql_connect(): Access denied for user: 'yourusername_osc1@localhost' (Using password: YES) in /home/yourusername/public_html/catalog/includes/functions/database.php on line 19
Unable to connect to database server!

What this means is that your database now exists in cPanel, but it has no username and password assigned to it. To assign a username and password login to your cPanel and click "MySQL Databases" Scroll down till you see the below.

Your username will look something like this yourusername_databasename@localhost. The database name in our example error above is "osc1"

You will need to find out your databases password. To do so look at the error your page gave you and take note of the path.

Path from our example error:

/home/yourusername/public_html/catalog/includes/functions/database.php

You will now login to your sites FTP and go through the folders until you find the file listed in your error path.

You will now download the file to your computer. Once it\'s downloaded open it up and browse until you find your database password.

Example of what to look for: DB_SERVER_PASSWORD\', \'nvGHdCC0dCMz\');

nvGHdCC0dCMz would be our database password. We will now fill that password in for our database password, and and then press "add user"

The user has now been added, but it has not been assigned to a database.


Match up the user with the database it belongs to and then just click "add user to database"

You are done! If it doesn't work, you messed up somewhere in these directions and might have to try again. Contact Technical Support for more information.

  • 21 Users Found This Useful
Was this answer helpful?

Related Articles

What is the cPanel and what can I do with it?

Your cPanel contains most of what you need to manage your site. You can park domains, create...

Why can't I log into my cPanel or webmail?

Most office buildings as well as hotels have a firewall setup to block access to the ports...

What is an Inode?

An inode is a data structure used to keep information about a file on your hosting account. The...

Login to cPanel

Our hosting plans provide a full-featured cPanel control panel to our clients. The cPanel/WHM...

What is a CNAME Record

A CNAME, or Cononical Name, record tells DNS that this hostname is an alias of another domain...