Migrate
Perform the migration.
Pantheon provides a guided path for migrating existing sites to the platform. This process begins by clicking Migrate Existing Site.
The recommended way to migrate WordPress sites from another host is to use the Pantheon Migration plugin, developed by BlogVault.
Watch: Guided WordPress Migrations
Open your Personal or Professional Workspace dashboard and select the Migrate Existing Site button on the lower right side of the page:
Select WordPress:
Then enter your existing production URL for the site you want to migrate (e.g.,
example.com) and click Continue:
Enter the name of your new Pantheon site, select a workspace for the site (optional), and click Create Site:
When a workspace is selected, you will be prompted to confirm your selection. Review your selection and when ready click Confirm in the popup to continue:
Click Generate Machine Token and re-authenticate if prompted:
Copy the token to your clipboard now or in the following step. Click the Continue to Migration button.
Click Go to wp-admin, and a new tab will open for your WordPress admin dashboard. Do not close the Pantheon Site Dashboard tab in your browser.
Log into your existing site as an admin, the button from the above step sends you directly to our plugin page. Click Install Now, then click Activate.
Copy and paste your machine token and site name from the Pantheon Site Dashboard into the plugin form:
You will see a new page where BlogVault validates the information provided (site name and token), then updates once the migration is in progress and updates once again when completed. You'll also receive an email upon migration completion.
Go back to the Pantheon tab and click Confirm migration progress. Your site's dashboard appears.
The WordPress Native PHP Sessions plugin is automatically installed during the migration process. For more details on this plugin, see WordPress and PHP Sessions.
The process described on this page is supported for Drupal 7 sites only.
- Modern Drupal sites should instead refer to this composer-based migration process.
- Older Drupal 8 sites not managed by composer should instead refer to this manual migration process.
Open your Personal or Professional Workspace dashboard and click the Migrate Existing Site button:
Select Drupal 7:
Enter the name of your new Pantheon site, select a workspace for the site (optional), and click Create Site:
When a workspace is selected, you will be prompted to confirm your selection. Review your selection and when ready click Confirm in the popup to continue:
When the Drupal site deployment is complete, click Continue:
Complete the following procedures, as prompted in the Site Dashboard:
Once all 3 components of your site have been added manually, click Finish site migration:
You now have a Dev environment containing your migrated site, including your Content Management System (accessible via the Site Admin button).
To create your Test environment:
Click the Test tab, then click Initialize Test Environment to create your Test environment.
This takes a few moments.
Go to the Database / Files tab and select the following:
- From this Environment: Development
- Clone Database: Checked
- Clone Files: Checked
Click Clone the Database & the Files from Development into the Test Environment.
To create your Live environment:
- Go to the Site Dashboard.
- Click the Live tab.
- Click Initialize Live Environment to create your Live environment.
Go to the the Database / Files tab and select the following:
- From this Environment: Development
- Clone Database: Checked
- Clone Files: Checked
Click Clone the Database & the Files from Test into the Live Environment.
Type "CLONE" and then click Overwrite This Environment when prompted to confirm you want to go live.
Review Troubleshooting or contact Support if the migration is unsuccessful. Include a link to the Site Dashboard and any details you can provide, such as where you are migrating the site from.