Transfer hosting between sites

Note: We’re transitioning to Workspaces, and this article has been updated to reflect that change. Visit the blog post to read more about these updates and changes.‍

If you’re looking for similar content that covers account-specific behavior, please visit our original lesson about transferring hosting between projects. You can also learn how to check if your account is on Workspaces.

In this lesson, you’ll learn how to determine when you might need a hosting transfer and how to request one with the following: 

1. Understand a hosting transfer
2. Request a hosting transfer

Understand a hosting transfer

A hosting transfer is the process of moving hosting (also called a site plan) from one site in your Workspace to another site in your Workspace –– without taking your site offline. 

For example, you might have an older site in your Workspace that currently has hosting and is already published to its custom domain. However, you’ve created a new design to update your old website, and you want to seamlessly transfer the hosting from the old site to your new design without interrupting your site’s uptime. 

If you request a hosting transfer from the old site to the new site, you can avoid canceling hosting on your old site. 

Hosting transfers are only available for sites that meet the following criteria:

• Both sites must be in the same Workspace
• The original site must have an active hosting plan
• The site to which hosting will be transferred must not already have a site plan associated with it 
• If the new site to which the hosting will be transferred has CMS or Ecommerce features, the original site will also need a CMS or Ecommerce hosting plan before a hosting transfer can occur (e.g., you’ll need to upgrade your old site’s hosting plan to the hosting tier level that will accommodate the needs of your new site before requesting a transfer) 

Request a hosting transfer

Important: Hosting can only be transferred between sites within the same Workspace.

While hosting transfers are not yet possible for you to do on your own, if your sites meet the criteria above, please contact support for assistance in performing the hosting transfer for you. 

For the quickest hosting transfer, be sure to include the following account verification information in your request:

• The email address for your Webflow account (open Account settings > Email settings)
• Your Webflow account’s creation date and timestamp, in full, exactly as it appears (open Account settings > Profile tab, and scroll down to Account details at the very bottom of the page)

You’ll also need to include:

• The subdomain.webflow.io link for the site that currently has hosting
• The subdomain.webflow.io link for the site that should receive hosting

You can locate your site’s subdomain.webflow.io link by visiting Site settings > General tab. Your unique subdomain.webflow.io link appears in the Subdomain field.

Once the hosting transfer is complete, our support team will let you know you can publish your new site to your custom domain. 

If your sites aren’t eligible for a hosting transfer, the other option is to cancel the site plan for the old site and start a separate site plan on the new site. For more details about this option, contact support.