How long does a WordPress to Shopify migration take?

It depends on the size of your catalogue and how much custom content you have. A small store with a few dozen products can be done in a few days of focused work. A larger store with hundreds of products, a big blog and lots of custom pages takes longer, mostly because of the redirect mapping and testing. Rushing the redirects is where people lose rankings, so build in time for that.

Will I lose my SEO rankings when I move to Shopify?

Not if you preserve your URLs properly. The single biggest risk to your rankings is old URLs returning 404 errors after the move. Map every old WordPress URL to its matching new Shopify URL with a 301 redirect, and search engines pass most of the ranking value across. Skip that step and you can lose hard-won rankings overnight.

Why are 301 redirects so important in a migration?

A 301 redirect tells search engines that a page has permanently moved to a new address, so they should transfer the old page's ranking value to the new one. Without redirects, every link and ranking pointing at your old URLs hits a dead end. That is the fastest way to tank your traffic during a migration, and it is completely avoidable.

Can I move my WordPress blog posts to Shopify?

Yes. Shopify has a built-in blog, and you can move your posts across, either manually for a small blog or with a migration app for a large one. Keep the content, headings and images close to the originals so the posts still match the searches they ranked for, and redirect the old post URLs to the new ones.

Do I need to migrate my customers and past orders?

It is worth it. Bringing across your customer list keeps your marketing intact, and importing past orders gives you a complete history in one place. Shopify has import tools for both, and there are migration apps that handle larger or messier data. Always spot-check a sample of records after import to be sure nothing was mangled.

What happens to my product URLs on Shopify?

Shopify uses its own URL structure, so your product and collection addresses will change from the WordPress ones. That is fine as long as you redirect each old URL to its new Shopify equivalent with a 301. Shopify lets you create these redirects inside the admin, so you can map them all before you go live.

Should I keep my WordPress site running after migrating?

Keep it accessible but not public for a short while as a reference, so you can check the old content and confirm your redirects match. Once you are confident everything has moved across and the redirects are working, you can take the old site down. Do not point your domain at both at once.

Can I migrate from WooCommerce to Shopify myself?

Yes, especially for a smaller store. The product export, Shopify setup and imports are all doable without a developer if you are comfortable with spreadsheets and admin panels. The part people find fiddliest is the redirect mapping and the testing. If your store is large or your revenue depends on it, it is worth getting help rather than risking a botched cutover.

How do I test a Shopify store before going live?

Place real test orders through the full checkout, using different products, shipping options and payment methods. Confirm that order confirmation emails send, orders appear in the admin, stock levels update and taxes calculate correctly. Only point your domain at Shopify once the checkout works cleanly every time.

WordPress to Shopify Migration Checklist (2026): Keep Your SEO

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Moving a store from WordPress to Shopify is not hard. Doing it without losing your search rankings is where people come unstuck.

I have done a real WordPress to Shopify migration for a live store, SAM Leisure's trade store, which I moved off WordPress about two months ago. I am migrating another one now, a skincare and dermatology shop, using the same checklist. This checklist is the order I worked in, with the step that protects your traffic, the redirects, given the weight it deserves.

If you have decided you are moving and just want to get started, you can set up your Shopify store here. If you want the full plan first, work through the checklist below in order. The order matters.

Before you touch anything: understand the real risk

The main danger in any migration is not the products or the theme. It is broken URLs.

Your old WordPress pages have addresses that Google knows and that other sites link to. When you move to Shopify, those addresses change. If you do nothing, every one of them becomes a dead end, and the rankings attached to them fall away.

The fix is simple and non-negotiable: a 301 redirect from every old URL to its new home. Get that right and you keep your traffic. Get it wrong and you can undo years of SEO in a weekend. Everything below is built around not making that mistake.

The migration checklist, in order

1. Audit your current content and products

Start with a complete inventory. List every product, page, blog post and category on your WordPress site.

Run a crawler over the site and export a full list of URLs. This one file is your master map. You will use it to check nothing gets left behind, and later to build your redirects. Do not skip it, because you cannot redirect URLs you never recorded.

2. Export your products from WordPress

Export your WooCommerce products to a CSV file. Include titles, descriptions, prices, SKUs, variants and image URLs.

Then clean the file so it lines up with the format Shopify's product importer expects. Tidy data here saves hours of fixing broken product pages later. Check for missing images, odd characters and variant rows that do not match.

3. Set up your Shopify store

Create your Shopify account and get the shell right before importing anything. Pick a theme, set your currency, configure tax, and put your branding in place.

Doing this first means you are importing into a finished frame rather than building around a pile of half-imported products. It keeps the whole job calmer.

4. Import products, customers and orders

Import your cleaned product CSV into Shopify. Then bring across your customers and your past orders, using Shopify's own import tools or a migration app for larger or messier data.

Once imported, check a sample by hand. Open a handful of products, a few customer records and some orders, and confirm the details survived the trip. It is far cheaper to catch an import problem now than after launch.

5. Recreate your pages and blog

Rebuild your key pages: about, contact, delivery, returns and any policy pages. Move your blog posts across too, since a blog is often a big share of a store's search traffic.

Keep the content and headings close to the originals. The closer a moved page stays to what it ranked for, the more of its ranking it holds. This is not the moment for a full rewrite.

Recreate your menus in Shopify so customers move around the new store the way they did the old one. Point every menu item at the correct new Shopify URL and click through each one to be sure it resolves.

Broken menu links look sloppy and they cost you sales. Test them all.

7. Map old URLs to new with 301 redirects

This is the step that decides whether your traffic survives. Give it real time.

Take the master URL list from step one. For every old WordPress URL, create a 301 redirect pointing to the matching new Shopify URL. Shopify lets you create these redirects inside the admin, so you can prepare them before you go live.

Work through the list methodically. Products to products, categories to collections, blog posts to blog posts, pages to pages. Leave nothing unmapped. If an old page has no obvious equivalent, redirect it to the nearest sensible page rather than letting it 404. This one step is worth more to your rankings than the theme, the apps and the branding combined.

8. Set up payments and shipping

Configure Shopify Payments, or your chosen gateway, so you can actually take money. Then set up your shipping zones, rates and tax to match how you sold before.

Get this wrong and customers either cannot check out or get charged the wrong postage. Both cost you orders on day one.

9. Test the checkout

Do not trust it, test it. Place real test orders through the full checkout, using different products, shipping options and payment methods.

Confirm that confirmation emails send, orders land in the admin, stock levels update and taxes calculate correctly. Run it enough times that a clean checkout feels boring. A broken checkout on launch day is the most expensive kind of bug there is.

10. Go live and monitor

Point your domain at Shopify, then watch it like a hawk for the first few weeks.

Keep Google Search Console open and watch for a spike in 404 errors, which tells you a redirect is missing. Check your redirects are firing, and keep an eye on analytics for any traffic drop. Fix gaps the moment they appear, not next month. The first fortnight after launch is when problems are cheapest to catch.

Keep the old site around, briefly

Do not delete your WordPress site the instant you launch. Keep it accessible as a reference so you can check old content and confirm your redirects point where they should.

Just do not have both live on the same domain at once. Once you are confident everything moved across and the redirects hold, you can retire the old site.

A note on moving hosts at the same time

If your WordPress site is on a registrar or host you have outgrown, a migration is a natural moment to sort that too. My guide on how to move from 123 Reg to SiteGround covers that side if it applies to you. Just do not change too many things in one go without a clear plan, or you will not know which change caused any problem.

Weighing it up first

If you are still deciding whether Shopify is the right destination at all, read my honest Shopify vs WooCommerce UK costs breakdown before you commit. It is better to be sure of the move before you start the work.

When you are ready to begin, you can start your Shopify store here.

Want it done for you?

A migration is one of those jobs where a small mistake on the redirects is expensive and hard to spot until the traffic has already gone. If you would rather have it handled properly the first time, that is what my agency does. We migrate stores to Shopify with the SEO preserved, and we treat the redirect mapping as the main event, not an afterthought. Take a look at Glide Marketing if you want a safe pair of hands.

Mike McDonnell, Founder of Glide Marketing

WordPress to Shopify Migration Checklist