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Move a site to a different plan

Updated on November 22nd, 2022

Because of the way Flywheel plans are designed, moving a site in or out of a plan requires cloning the original site to the new location, pointing DNS to the cloned site’s IP address (if applicable), and deleting the original site. Follow the steps below to get your site cloned in no time!

Back up the site

The original site won’t be affected by the cloning process, but since the clone will be created from the latest backup, this will ensure that any recent changes to the site are included in the clone.

  1. Navigate to the Backups tab of the site’s dashboard.
  2. Click the + button to create a fresh backup.
  3. Optionally, add a description to the backup.
  4. Your backup will take a few minutes to complete, based on the size of the site (usually about 10 minutes per gigabyte).

Note

You’ll want to make sure the site is not modified after this backup is created, or the cloned site may be outdated.

Clone the site

Once the backup is complete, you can kick off the site clone.

  1. Back at the site’s Flywheel dashboard, click the gear icon.
  2. Select Clone site.

Choose the site destination

When cloning, there are 3 options for the clone destination. Choose the one that applies to your situation:

I’m transferring a site into an existing plan Choose “Add site to existing plan”. You’ll see the name(s) of all existing plan(s) with available site slots.
I’m transferring a site to its own plan Choose “I’d like to get a new plan” and select the plan on the next page.
I’m transferring a site out of my plan for a client to take over billing Choose “Create a demo site & pay later”. (Note that you must have a verified account and an available demo slot to do this.)

  1. If you want, enter a custom site name Site name and Temporary domain.
  2. Click the green button to begin the clone.

Note

You must remove the domain name from the live site before it can be added to the cloned site. The Flywheel Dashboard won’t allow for a domain with the same name to be added to another subscription on Flywheel until it’s removed. When the domain is removed the site will go down until it is readded to the clone.

Point DNS to the new site

This step only applies if the original site was live, but if so, you’ll need to point DNS for that site’s domain to the new clone’s IP address, rather than the original site’s IP address.

If the original site was just a demo site or was not yet live with a domain other than the Flywheel temporary domain, you can safely ignore this step.

Note

Bear in mind that DNS propagation usually goes very quickly, particularly when simply changing the IP address, but it can potentially take up to 48 hours for full DNS propagation. More on DNS setup here.

Cancel or delete the original site

Once the DNS is pointed (if necessary) and fully propagated, your new cloned site is now the live site! All web traffic will be routing to that new site, so the old site can be deleted (demo site or site on a bulk plan), or completely cancelled (single-site subscription).

Need help?

If you have any questions our Happiness Engineers are here to help!

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