WordPress to Squarespace Migration: The Complete 2026 Guide

A WordPress to Squarespace migration takes five steps: export your content as an XML file, import it into Squarespace, rebuild the design, set up redirects for any URL that changes, and point your domain over last. The import brings your posts and pages. It does not bring your theme, your plugins, or the SEO settings you spent time on.

What a WordPress to Squarespace migration transfers

The importer takes your blog posts, your static pages, and most of your images, along with authors, categories and tags. That's where it stops.

Your theme stays behind, because Squarespace templates work differently. Plugins don't come across either, since there's nothing on the other side to run them. Contact forms get rebuilt with a Squarespace form block, which takes about five minutes. The one that surprises people is Yoast or Rank Math data: all those page titles and meta descriptions you wrote won't follow the content over, so plan on typing them again for the pages that matter.

If you sell through WooCommerce, products move on their own with a CSV export and import. Orders and customer accounts don't move at all. Export those for your records before you shut anything down.

Do this before you touch anything

Get a list of every URL on your site first. The free version of Screaming Frog will crawl it for you, or you can pull your sitemap if the site is small. You need this list to build redirects later and you can't get it back once the old site is gone.

Next, open Search Console and look at which pages actually get clicks. A migration is a good excuse to cut dead weight. Pages with no traffic, no links and no purpose don't need a redirect or a rebuild. Most sites I move end up 20 to 40% smaller and do better for it.

Last, leave WordPress running. You build the new site on a Squarespace trial, and if you work with a Circle Platinum Partner that trial runs 12 months instead of two weeks, so there's no reason to take anything down early. The actual switch happens at the domain level and takes minutes.

Running the import

In WordPress, go to Tools, then Export, choose "All content" and download the XML file. In Squarespace, go to Settings, then Website, then Import, pick WordPress and upload it. Give it a few minutes. Big sites take longer.

Then go read your posts, because the import is a starting point and not a finished job. Three things to check on each one. Images usually come through, but anything that was hotlinked or run by a gallery plugin often doesn't, so re-upload the ones that broke. Old shortcodes from plugins show up as leftover text in square brackets, and you can delete those. Embeds normally need to be added again with Squarespace blocks, and my video embed guide covers the clean way to do it.

Rebuilding the design

There's no way to bring a WordPress theme over, and you wouldn't want to. Getting off that stack is usually the reason people move in the first place.

What this really means is that your migration is also a redesign. Your content is already sitting there after the import, so the work left is layout, type and navigation inside the Squarespace editor.

This is the step where a site either ends up looking like a template someone filled in, or looking like these. If the site brings in business, it's worth paying for once. My custom builds and redesigns run on a fixed quote, and moving your content is part of the project rather than a surprise line item.

Redirects, metadata and the sitemap

This is the part that decides whether your rankings survive the move. WordPress URLs often look like /2023/05/post-name/ or carry a category in the path. Squarespace blog URLs look like /blog/post-name or whatever you set. Every URL that changes needs a 301 redirect, or Google and every site that ever linked to you hits a dead end.

Squarespace handles this under Settings, Developer Tools, URL Mappings. One line per redirect, in the format /old-path -> /new-path 301. Work down the URL list you pulled earlier and start with the pages that had traffic and links pointing at them. Keep your slugs the same wherever you can, since fewer changed URLs means fewer redirects and less to go wrong.

After that, retype your titles and meta descriptions on the pages that earn money. Squarespace has fields for both under each page's SEO tab, so no plugin needed. Connect your domain, verify the site in Search Console and submit the new sitemap at /sitemap.xml. Expect rankings to bounce around for two to six weeks. That part is normal. A permanent drop isn't, and that's what the redirects prevent.

Doing it yourself or hiring it out

A personal blog with thirty posts is a fine weekend project. Follow the steps above and you'll be okay.

It changes when the site makes money, has hundreds of posts, runs a store, or holds rankings you can't afford to lose. One bad redirect map costs more in lost traffic than a migration costs to hire out.

Migrations are one of the things I do most. Content moved, design rebuilt custom, every redirect mapped, metadata retyped, domain switched with no downtime, and the whole thing handed off in two to five weeks with video training so you can run it. Here's how that works. Clients also get 25% off their first year of Squarespace and the 12-month trial while we build.

Frequently asked questions

Will I lose my Google rankings when I switch to Squarespace?

Not if the migration is done properly. Rankings come from your content, your links and working redirects, not from the platform serving the pages. You'll see some movement for a few weeks while Google recrawls, then it settles. The permanent drops happen when redirects get skipped.

How long does a WordPress to Squarespace migration take?

A small blog is a weekend if you're doing it yourself. My migrations include a full custom redesign and run two to five weeks, with the old site live the entire time.

Does Squarespace import WooCommerce products?

Products yes, through a CSV export and import. Order history and customer accounts don't come over, so export those for your books before you close the old store.

Can I keep my domain and my email?

Yes. You either connect the domain to Squarespace and leave it registered where it's, or transfer it in. Email runs separately from your website, so Google Workspace or whatever you use keeps working while you repoint the website records.

Moving a site you can't afford to break? Book a free call and I'll look at your WordPress site and give you a fixed quote for the whole thing, redirects included.