WP All-in-One Migration: Export, Import and Fix Failed Moves

WP All-in-One Migration packages a full WordPress site, database, media library, themes and plugins, into a single .wpress file that you upload on the destination server. The free version exports a site of any size but caps imports at 512MB, and that one restriction, along with a handful of PHP configuration values, explains most failed migrations. This guide covers the export and import process step by step, where WP All-in-One Migration stores its backup files, how to bring a large site under the 512MB ceiling without paying for an extension, the GDPR questions that apply when UK and Irish businesses change hosting country, and a troubleshooting table for imports that stall at 0% or 100%.

ProfileTree’s web development team has run WP All-in-One Migration across dozens of client launches and host transfers. What follows reflects what happens on real UK and Irish shared hosting, not just what the documentation promises.

What WP All-in-One Migration Does

WP All-in-One Migration, built by ServMask, bundles your entire WordPress installation into one .wpress archive. When you import that archive on a new server, the plugin rewrites internal URLs and file paths automatically, so content points at the correct domain rather than your old host or your local machine.

That rewriting step is what separates it from a manual file transfer. Copy files across by FTP and every internal link, image path and serialised database entry still references the old domain. WP All-in-One Migration handles those replacements in the background, including serialised strings that break when edited with a plain find and replace.

WP All-in-One Migration has passed five million active installations on the WordPress directory, which makes it one of the most widely used migration tools available. For businesses working with ProfileTree on a WordPress build or platform move, it is usually the fastest route from a finished staging build to a live server. The same workflow applies to a host switch, though a domain change or CMS replatform is a larger job that belongs in a structured website migration plan.

What the Export File Contains

The .wpress file holds the full MySQL database (posts, pages, users, WooCommerce orders, plugin settings), everything in wp-content/uploads, all installed themes, all installed plugins, and your WordPress core configuration. Yes, All-in-One WP Migration exports the database as standard; there is no separate database export step and no option to leave it out.

That completeness is the reason the file grows quickly. A modest brochure site sits around 100MB to 200MB. A WooCommerce store with a few thousand product images passes 512MB without much effort.

Where WP All-in-One Migration Stores Backup Files

Backups created by WP All-in-One Migration live in wp-content/ai1wm-backups/ on the server. If you use the plugin’s backup feature rather than downloading the .wpress file to your computer, that folder is where the archive sits.

Two things are worth knowing about that location. It is publicly accessible by default on some server configurations, so anyone who guesses the filename can download your entire database. Adding a deny rule to .htaccess, or asking your host to block direct access to the directory, closes that gap. The folder also accumulates old archives, and on a site with monthly backups it can quietly consume several gigabytes of disk space. Clearing it before an export keeps the next migration file smaller.

Preparing Your Site Before You Export

Rushing straight to the export button is the single most common reason migrations fail or produce oversized files. Twenty minutes of preparation usually saves hours of troubleshooting on the destination server.

Update Everything First

Run all WordPress core, theme and plugin updates on the source site before you export. Importing outdated software onto a fresh server creates version conflicts that surface as white screens or an inaccessible admin panel. Updating first means the migrated site matches the software versions you have already tested.

Clean the Database

WordPress accumulates dead weight: post revisions, auto-drafts, trashed items, expired transients and spam comments. On a site running for a year or more, that debris commonly adds 50MB to 150MB. Use a cleanup plugin to delete post revisions, clear expired transients and empty the spam and trash queues. On a mature site this step alone often cuts 20% to 30% off the export file.

Clear and Deactivate Caching

Deactivate any caching plugin before running the export. Cache files serve no purpose on the new server and can add hundreds of megabytes to the archive. Clear the cache first, then deactivate the plugin, then export.

Take an Independent Backup

Back up the source site separately before touching anything. WP All-in-One Migration is reliable, but if the source is a live site you want a restore point that does not depend on the migration plugin behaving. Download the database and the wp-content folder directly from your hosting control panel; it takes five minutes.

Before moving on, confirm all five of these:

• Core, plugin and theme updates applied
• Post revisions, spam comments and trashed items deleted
• Cache cleared and caching plugin deactivated
• Independent backup downloaded and stored off-server
• Clean WordPress installation ready on the destination server

How to Export Your WordPress Site

With the site cleaned and backed up, the export takes a few minutes. In the WordPress dashboard on the source site, go to All-in-One WP Migration > Export. Select Export To > File unless you have a specific reason to use FTP or cloud storage; a local file is the most reliable option for both local-to-live moves and host-to-host transfers.

Advanced Options That Cut File Size

Open the Advanced Options panel before you click Export To. This is where you exclude anything that does not need to travel:

• Do not export spam comments. Always tick this.
• Do not export post revisions. Tick this if you skipped the database cleanup.
• Do not export themes (except active). Useful when several inactive themes are installed.
• Do not export deactivated plugins. Deactivated plugins add weight and serve nothing on the live site.
• Do not export media library. Only for very large sites where you plan to move media separately by FTP.

Ticking the first three is enough for most migrations and costs you nothing you need. The media library option is the one to treat carefully, because images will break on the imported site until the uploads folder is transferred and reconnected.

Exporting from a Local Environment

Local installs running at localhost/wordpress behave the same way, with one difference: the destination URL is entirely different from the source, so WP All-in-One Migration performs a larger set of path replacements. Hardcoded absolute URLs in page builder content, custom CSS or theme options sometimes survive that replacement and still point at localhost after the move. Check page builder templates and any custom code blocks first.

If you have been building on a local install because you have not committed to a host yet, the practical constraints are covered in this guide to running WordPress without hosting. The migration itself only works once a live server with WordPress installed is waiting at the other end.

How to Import to Your Live Site

The import side is where the free version’s limits bite, so work through the destination setup before uploading anything.

Preparing the Destination Install

The destination server needs a clean WordPress installation. Clean means WordPress is installed and the database contains only the default tables, with no existing content, no configured plugins and no theme customisations that could conflict with what you are importing. Installing WordPress through your host’s one-click installer and then leaving it untouched is exactly right.

Server specification matters more than most guides admit. A cheap shared plan with a 30-second PHP execution ceiling will fail on a 400MB import that a mid-tier plan handles without complaint.

Running the Import

Install and activate All-in-One WP Migration on the clean installation. No configuration is needed. Go to All-in-One WP Migration > Import, choose Import From > File, and select the .wpress file.

A progress bar appears. Larger sites can take several minutes. Do not close the browser tab or move to another page while the import runs; if the connection drops, you start again. When WP All-in-One Migration finishes, click Proceed on the confirmation screen. The page refreshes and logs you out, because your login details now match the source site rather than the temporary ones from the clean install.

The First Checks After Import

Five things need checking straight away, and skipping them is how migrations look successful for a week and then start losing traffic:

1. Go to Settings > Permalinks and click Save Changes without altering anything. This regenerates the .htaccess rewrite rules, which frequently break page routing after an import.
2. Confirm the SSL certificate is active and HTTPS resolves properly on the new server.
3. Test contact forms, checkout and any third-party API connections, since these often carry hardcoded URLs or credentials tied to the old environment.
4. Check that media loads on the front end and that no images resolve to the old domain.
5. Run a speed test to establish a baseline on the new server. GTmetrix reports give you a before-and-after comparison worth keeping.

Search visibility takes a few weeks to settle after any host change. If rankings move in the wrong direction and the technical checks all pass, the cause usually sits elsewhere, which is where a technical SEO review earns its cost.

Working Around the 512MB Import Limit

The free version of WP All-in-One Migration caps imports at 512MB. Exports are unlimited, which is why the failure appears late: the export completes fine, and the destination server then rejects the file with a maximum upload size error. Many sites that appear to breach the limit can be brought under it with targeted cleanup.

Find What Is Making the Site Large

In your hosting control panel, check the size of three directories. wp-content/uploads is nearly always the largest, wp-content/plugins can add 50MB to 100MB for large commercial plugins, and wp-content/themes carries weight from unused themes with bundled demo assets.

If uploads is the culprit, ask whether all of that media is actually in use. Images from deleted posts, superseded PDFs and multiple resized versions of the same file inflate that folder faster than anything else.

Offload the Media Library

Moving media to external storage such as Amazon S3, Cloudflare R2 or a CDN removes it from the migration file entirely and usually improves front-end performance on the new server. Offload plugins handle the URL rewriting.

The alternative costs nothing: export with the media library excluded, then copy wp-content/uploads to the new server by FTP. Two steps instead of one, and it lets you migrate a site of any size on the free plugin.

Delete Inactive Plugins and Themes

Delete rather than deactivate anything you are not using. Deactivated plugins still travel in the archive unless excluded, and deleted ones cannot. The same applies to themes: if you run a child theme, keep the parent and child pair and remove the rest.

When the Unlimited Extension Is Worth Buying

If the database alone exceeds 512MB, or you migrate large stores regularly, buy the extension. The All-in-One WP Migration Unlimited Extension removes the import restriction, adds WP-CLI support and includes priority support, and is sold as an annual subscription (listed at around $69 per year at the time of writing, though pricing changes, so check before budgeting).

For agencies and businesses running frequent moves as part of ongoing development work, the cost is recovered in the first migration that would otherwise have burned an afternoon.

Troubleshooting WP All-in-One Migration Errors

Most WP All-in-One Migration failures trace back to server configuration rather than the plugin itself.

“Migration failures are almost never caused by the plugin itself. In the vast majority of cases, the problem is a server-side configuration, PHP memory limits, execution timeouts, or firewall rules, that can usually be resolved in minutes once you know where to look.” Ciaran Connolly, founder of ProfileTree

The pattern holds across shared hosting in particular, where resource ceilings are set low by default to protect other accounts on the same server.

Common Errors and Their Fixes

Increasing PHP Limits on UK Hosts

On most UK shared hosting, PHP settings can be raised by creating or editing a .user.ini file in the site root:

upload_max_filesize = 512M

post_max_size = 512M

max_execution_time = 300

memory_limit = 256M

Several UK providers expose the same values in the control panel under PHP settings, which avoids editing files altogether. If neither route is available, raise a support ticket quoting those four directives; hosts handle this request daily. Bear in mind that these ceilings exist to stop one account exhausting a shared server, so treat a permanent increase as a signal that the site has outgrown the plan rather than as a fix in itself.

GDPR and Data Residency for UK and Irish Businesses

This is the part competitor guides skip, and it matters for businesses in Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland and the wider UK. A migration moves data, and that data routinely includes customer email addresses, contact form submissions, WooCommerce order records and user accounts. Where it physically lands affects your obligations.

What Changes When You Switch Host Country

UK GDPR and EU GDPR both restrict transfers of personal data outside the UK or EEA without adequate safeguards. Moving from a US server to a UK or Irish data centre takes you towards compliance. The risk runs the other way: migrating from a UK or EU server to a US provider without an adequacy decision or standard contractual clauses in place may create a problem where none existed.

The Information Commissioner’s Office updated its guidance in January 2026 and now applies a three-step test for identifying restricted transfers, set out in its brief guide to international transfers. Before migrating, confirm where both hosts keep their data centres, whether your hosting contract includes a Data Processing Agreement, and whether your privacy notice still describes reality. Keeping data inside UK jurisdiction is one of the practical advantages of using a local hosting provider, along with easier escalation when something breaks mid-migration. If the site collects personal data through forms, the same review should cover how those forms are built, which is covered in this guide to GDPR-compliant web forms.

Deleting the .wpress File After the Move

A .wpress archive is a full copy of your customer database sitting as a downloadable file. Once the import is verified, delete the archive from both servers and from the ai1wm-backups folder, and remove any copy sitting in a shared cloud drive. Leaving it in place is the sort of thing that turns a routine migration into a reportable incident.

WP All-in-One Migration vs Duplicator vs UpdraftPlus

All three plugins move WordPress sites, but they suit different jobs.

WP All-in-One Migration is the right choice when you want the simplest path from one WordPress install to another and the site sits under 512MB. Duplicator suits developers who want more control and are comfortable running an installer script. UpdraftPlus is a backup tool first, so it complements rather than replaces the other two.

Moving a WordPress Site: What Comes Next

WP All-in-One Migration handles the mechanical half of a move. It will not tune the site for its new environment, catch performance problems introduced by the host change, or confirm that everything still works under real traffic. A clean migration onto the wrong hosting setup is still a problem.

If you want a WordPress migration handled properly, or a review of your current setup before you commit to a new host, talk to the ProfileTree team.

Frequently Asked Questions