Copy a live WordPress site to a localhost using the All In One WP Migration plugin in six easy steps. This plugin is great for testing or developing your WordPress Site offline.
Copy a Live WordPress site to a localhost
The All-in-One WP Migration plugin makes it so easy to copy a live WordPress site to a localhost that even a novice can do it. There is no need to use FTP is you don’t want to. Simply create a copy of your live site and save the copy to your computer. Then all you have to do is drag and drop the copy to your local computer. That’s it your done!
Step 1
Go to your live WordPress site and install and activate a plugin called All In One WP Migration.
Step 2
Once the plugin has been activated, you will notice a new Icon called All-in-One WP Migration. Go ahead and click on Export and then on “EXPORT TO”. This will open a drop down menu from which you can select “File”. A new window will popup. You can then click on the Download button and select a place to save your copy of your website.
Step 3
Open Local by Flywheel and create a fresh install of WordPress. If you are not sure how to do this, check out this tutorial and it will guide you step by step.
Step 4
Once you have installed a fresh install of WordPress, login to your local site then install and activate the plugin All-in-One WP Migration plugin.
Step 5
Now go ahead and select “Import” from within the All-in-One WP Migration icon. Now go ahead and click on “IMPORT FROM” and select “File” from the drop down menu. No select the file that we downloaded earlier in the process. The importation will now begin. You will receive a Warning. Don’t worry about that, just click on Proceed to continue with the importation.
The installation of you live site to your local host takes a few minutes. Just sit back and relax and let the process finish.
Step 6
Once the installation is complete. You will get a message that says “Your data has been imported successfully!”
All you have to do now is click on the “Permalinks Settings” link and save your permalinks twice.
In order to login to your local site, you will now have to use the user name and password for your live site.
That’s it, your all done.
I like the plugin and have used it many time. The only issue I have is it deletes the login credentials on the site you are migrating to. If you are moving a demo site to a client’s site, the client loses his credentials. I wish there is a work around that the credentials are kept even after migrating. Any ideas?
Hi John,
I don’t offer private help at the moment. I focus on tutorials to help the masses. If you have a question. Post it here and I’ll see how I can help.
Thanks for the video, l have watched the video and did exactly according to the video but l cannot login again into my wordpress dashboard despite that l used the live server credentials (username and password) on the login page. please what is the problem and how can l resolve it.
Hi Ruth,
I had the same issue and i found the problem. The wp_users table is somehow overwritten in the local DB and your user_email will be renamed after your local site name like this:: “thisremainsthe same@localsitename.local“. The password remains the same.
In order for you to find the exact username, you can follow the next steps:
Go to the Database TAB in FlyWheel;
Click on ADMINER (a browser page will be opened);
Look for select wp_users in the left side;
Click on SELECT in there and your users will be revealed. In the user_email column you can find the one you can login with,
Hope it helps. Cheers.
Thanks for the video, l did exactly according to the video but l cannot login again into my wordpress dashboard (admin) despite that l used the live server credentials (username and password from the live server). please what is the problem and how can l resolve it sir.
In order to recreate and investigate this, I need more information. What program did you use to create the local site? i;e XAMPP, Local by Flywheel, etc.
Are you receiving an error message?
Hi Sir,
You video is very helpful, thanks a lot. However, I am having the same problem. I am using Local by Flywheel and also have confirmed the credentials following the steps outlined by Fulga. Am I missing anything? I have followed the process atleast 5 times but still doesn’t work.
It gives an error saying “The password you entered for [username] is invalid”.
I am logging into my live site with the same credentials and it works.
Please help. Thanks in advance.
What is “Fulga”. Sorry, not familiar with this term.
Fulga is the name(see above) of the user who commented on 6 June 2019
Please clarify where in the process you are encountering trouble.
1. Were you able to install your live site your local host?
2. Did you try login with the credentials that you use for your live site?
I am stuck at the second one. When I enter the credentials that I used for my live site, it says they are invalid. However, I can login perfectly fine into my live site.
In order to assist you, I have to recreate the issue you are having. In order to do this, I need detailed information. Please answer each question as I have asked them, that way I don’t make any incorrect assumptions.
1. Were you able to install your live site to your local host?
2. Were you able to login to the fresh install of WordPress on your local host?
3. Did you try to login to a copy of your live site on your local host using your live site credential?
Thank you for getting back to me.
1. Yes, if you mean that I can run my website from Local (software) by “Install”.
2. Yes, I was able to login to the fresh install of wordpess on my local host.
3. Yes and it kept on saying crendentials are invalid,
Just to add to the above, the credentials work fine before importing my live site. However after importing, they don’t work. Does it all makes sense?
I have tested today and did not find the issue you are encountering. However, resetting the password might help you. Here are the steps;
Go to Database TAB in FlyWheel
Click on ADMINER
Look for select wp_users in the left side and make sure “Select data” is selected on the right side
Put a check mark in the edit option and click on edit
In user_pass select “MD5”
Enter a new password beside MD5 and click save
That’s it your password is reset.
Hope this helps. Let me know if you have trouble with this. If you do, I’ll create a tutorial when I have a free moment.
all seems to go well, duplicating to localhost on wamp. – untill i rty to log on to admin or open the front end – whereupon it fails – I notice that it’s going to https – whereas the wamp server has no SSL … how do i export a secured https site to a https localhost?
oh- i should add that the live site runs behind a sucuri firewall – so i replaced the live version .htaccess filr with a standard default .htaccess – which works on first test opening (except that the site has no formatting … yet another problem to resolve 🙂
Heads up. Only works if your site export is under 512mb. Otherwise you need to pay for the plugin.
You also need another extension to get to 512mb which is free.
all-in-one-wp-migration-file-extension
So this is useless for me as its over 1GB unfortunately.
One tip for using Local set up, set the admin email, to be the LIVE admin email on set up of fresh WP install. Then you should get issue with email being dev.local
Hello! I have a question. If I export my client website to make improvements locally, what will happen with the live site on the serwer? This site will be still available for my client and his users or will be turn off till I import the website with improvements back?