Guide · Technical
Website Migration Checklist: Keep Your Rankings on Relaunch
This website migration checklist gives you the steps in order: prepare, map, redirect, launch and monitor. Follow them and you lower the risk of losing search traffic when a site relaunches. The steps below follow Google's own documentation on site moves.
Know what kind of move you are making
The steps depend on the move. Google treats a change of URLs as one kind of move. That covers HTTP to HTTPS, a new domain name, or new URL paths. A change of hosting or CDN with the same URLs is a different kind.
Google also asks you to change one thing at a time. If you want a new domain, a new CMS and a new layout, do them one after the other. That way, if traffic drops, you know which change caused it.
Plan the launch for a quiet time of the week. Fewer visitors are affected if something breaks, and your server has more room for Googlebot.
Sources: Google Search Central, How to move a site; Google Search Central, Changing your hosting
Before launch: prepare the new site
- Build the new site on the same CMS if you can, and import all content, images and downloads such as PDFs.
- Get your TLS certificates ready if you are moving to HTTPS.
- Write the robots.txt file the live site will need. Many teams block crawling while they build. Know exactly which blocks must come off on launch day.
- List every page that carries a noindex tag during testing, so you can remove each one at launch.
- Verify the old and new sites in Search Console, including every variant such as www, non-www, HTTP and HTTPS.
- Make sure your Search Console verification file or tag is in the new site.
- Set up web analytics on both sites.
- Check that the new server can handle heavier crawling. Google crawls a new site harder for a while, because old URLs now lead to it.
Map every old URL to a new one
This is the step that decides most outcomes. Build a list of old URLs from your sitemaps, your CMS, your server logs and the Links report in Search Console. Include images, videos, scripts and style files.
Next to each old URL, write the new URL that matches it. Then do three things on the new site:
- Give every page a self-referencing canonical tag.
- Update hreflang tags if you run pages for several languages or countries.
- Change internal links to point straight at the new URLs.
Save two lists for launch day: a sitemap of the new URLs, and the sites that link to your old pages. If you drop a page on purpose, make sure its old URL returns a 404 or 410 on the new site.
Set up redirects the right way
Use server-side permanent redirects. A 301 or a 308 tells Google the move is final. Google says a permanent redirect is a strong signal that the new URL should be the one it shows. Use client-side redirects only if you have no other choice.
Follow these rules:
- Send each old URL straight to its final page. Googlebot can follow up to 10 hops, but Google advises no more than 3, and fewer than 5 at the very most.
- Do not send many old pages to the home page. Google may treat that as a soft 404.
- A page merged into one new page can redirect to that single page.
- Small and medium sites should move all URLs at once. Large sites may move one section at a time.
Google also says that 301 and 302 redirects do not cause a loss of PageRank, so redirects alone are not a reason to fear a move.
Sources: Google Search Central, How to move a site; Google Search Central, Redirects and Google Search
Launch day
- Turn on the redirects.
- Remove the noindex tags and any robots.txt blocks that were only for testing.
- Test the redirects. The URL Inspection tool works for single URLs. For large lists, use a script or a crawler.
- If the domain or subdomain changes, send a Change of Address request in Search Console for the old site.
- Submit the new sitemap. You can then remove the old one.
- Update your own links, social profiles and ad campaigns. Ask the sites on your link list to update theirs, starting with the ones that send the most visits.
Do not use the Change of Address tool for an HTTP to HTTPS move, a www to non-www switch, or a change of paths on the same domain. For those, redirects and canonical tags are enough. The tool also needs you to be a verified owner of both sites with the same Google account.
Sources: Google Search Central, How to move a site; Search Console Help, Change of Address tool
After launch: watch and wait
Expect ranking changes for a while. Google says a small or medium site often takes a few weeks to move most pages, and larger sites take longer. Check these places often:
- The Sitemaps report. Indexed pages from the old sitemap should fall, and the new sitemap should climb. Warnings about redirects on the old sitemap are normal.
- The Index Coverage report. Look for sudden crawl errors.
- Search results data. New URLs should start to get impressions and clicks.
- Server logs and analytics. Look for Googlebot visits, unexpected error codes and traffic moving from old to new.
Keep the redirects live for as long as you can. Google says at least one year is typical. For a Change of Address, it shows notices for 180 days and says to keep redirects at least that long. Keep paying for the old domain for at least a year, so nobody else can buy it.
Sources: Google Search Central, How to move a site; Search Console Help, Change of Address tool
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