How do I move from WordPress to a custom website?
Short answerExport your content, list every URL and plugin, decide how each plugin’s job will be handled on the new site, then rebuild. Keep URLs identical where you can and redirect the rest. The biggest risks are forgotten plugin features, like forms or redirects already in place, and losing years of blog posts without a plan.
Thinking of leaving WordPress?
Send me your site. I’ll look at the plugins and structure and tell you what a move would involve, within two business days.
The longer answer
Audit what WordPress is quietly doing
Over the years a WordPress site picks up plugins that each do a small job: contact forms, SEO titles, redirects, cookie banners, analytics, caching, galleries. List every active plugin and write down what it does. Each one needs a replacement or a deliberate decision to drop it. Redirect plugins matter most, because they may already hold years of old redirects you’ll need to carry over.
Check the theme as well. Some themes bundle features like sliders, portfolios or custom post types that look like content but live in theme settings.
Moving the content
WordPress has a built-in export, and the content can also be pulled through its REST API. That makes moving posts and pages much easier than leaving a closed builder. You’ll still want to clean up as you go: remove shortcodes left behind by page builders, fix image paths, and decide whether old, thin posts should be merged, improved or retired with a redirect. Some owners keep WordPress as a headless CMS and only replace the front end.
Keeping URLs and search traffic
WordPress URL patterns vary: some include dates, categories or /blog/. Match them on the new site where you can. Where you can’t, map each one with a 301 redirect. Carry over titles and descriptions from your SEO plugin, check canonical tags, submit the new sitemap and monitor for 404s. The platform migration answer has the full checklist.
Media is easy to overlook. WordPress stores images under date-based upload paths, and some of those image URLs may rank in image search or be linked from other sites. Redirect the important ones.
What I’d do
Nick Lovett, founder of Tavro
People usually look at leaving WordPress because the site is slow, keeps breaking after updates, or nobody wants to touch it. I start with a plugin audit and a crawl of every URL, then decide what the new site handles natively and what goes away. Forms, redirects and SEO titles always come across. I prerender the new site to static HTML, so there’s nothing to patch weekly. Then I keep the old install available, unpublished, for a while after launch in case we need to look something up.
Follow-up questions
Yes. WordPress content exports cleanly, so posts can be moved with their URLs intact.
Each plugin’s function is replaced by built-in features, a lightweight service or dropped if it isn’t needed.
Yes, depending on the build. Options include a simple CMS, a headless WordPress backend or a care plan for edits.
Keep reading
- nick@tavro.ca
- 587-439-9994
- Calgary, Alberta