Guide
WordPress to Next.js migration
Move off a slow, plugin-heavy WordPress site without losing the content, rankings and integrations you already paid for.
The site still works. You have stopped trusting it.
Pages take too long to load. Plugin updates feel like a risk. The agency that built it is gone, or every change now needs a ticket. You are not looking for a redesign. You are looking for a way off the platform without throwing away the years of content and search equity sitting on it.
What is usually behind it
The theme and the plugins are the product
Performance, SEO and editorial workflow all depend on a stack nobody fully owns. When one plugin stalls, the whole site slows down or breaks.
The CMS and the front end are the same system
WordPress is serving pages, running forms, handling cache and exposing you to every plugin's security surface. There is no clean place to improve the public site without touching the rest.
Content is trapped in the presentation
Pages, URLs and modules were built as a theme, not as a content model. Moving them later is harder than it needed to be — which is why people stay.
Publishing has become a bottleneck
A page builder made the first few pages quick and every page since slow. Layouts drift, components get duplicated, and marketing ends up raising a ticket for changes the CMS was supposed to handle.
Hosting is masking the render cost
Caching plugins, an object cache and a CDN are layered on to hide how long a page takes to build. Each layer adds a way for stale or broken pages to reach a visitor, and none of them fix the underlying cost.
What a migration involves
A migration is a controlled cutover, not a rebuild that starts from a blank page. The current site stays live until the replacement is signed off on staging, and the work is sequenced so that the reversible steps happen first.
- Content model and URL map taken from what you already have, not invented afterwards
- Redirects written and tested before launch
- Integrations that still work — CRM, forms, booking, commerce — kept where they belong
- Tracking and analytics verified on staging so reporting does not reset on day one
- A content model your editors can use directly, without rebuilding layouts page by page
- Performance budgets agreed before build and measured on staging rather than asserted after launch
- The repository, hosting account and documentation handed over, so the platform is yours to move again
- A cutover you can reverse if something is missed
What it costs to find out
Most of this work starts with a Headless Assessment. £1,500, fixed. You get the architecture, the risks, and a costed route off WordPress. No obligation to build with us.
How we do this work
Modernise the presentation layer and core functionalities without ripping out commerce, CRM, or content systems that still work.
Platform migrationsRelated guides
- Slow WordPress site — what is actually causing itA slow WordPress site is rarely one plugin. It is usually the theme, the page builder, uncached database work and a front end that cannot get out of its own way.
- Migrating a website without losing SEO rankingsSearch equity is revenue infrastructure. A migration that treats URLs, redirects and metadata as an afterthought is how firms lose the traffic they already earned.
Common questions
Do we have to leave WordPress as a CMS?
Not necessarily. Many migrations keep WordPress as the editor and put Next.js in front of it. The assessment confirms whether that is the right split for your stack, or whether the CMS should move as well.
Will we lose our search rankings?
Nobody can promise rankings. What we can do is map every URL, write redirects, carry metadata and structured data across, and test that work on staging before anything public moves.
How long does a typical migration take?
The assessment usually takes two to three weeks. A migration commonly runs eight to sixteen weeks depending on content volume, integrations and how many domains are involved. The assessment sets the timeline for your site, not a generic one.
What happens to all our plugins?
Each one gets a decision rather than a default. Caching, security and SEO plugins are usually replaced by things the platform does natively. Forms, analytics and CRM connections become integrations. A few turn out to be unused, and a small number are genuinely load-bearing and need rebuilding as code. The assessment lists which is which before you commit.
Can our marketing team still edit the site themselves?
Yes. Editing stays in a CMS, and publishing updates the live site without a developer. What changes is that editors work with structured content — a case study, a location, a service — rather than assembling a page out of layout blocks each time.
Do we have to redesign at the same time?
No, and it is usually better not to. A migration you can verify is one where the pages look the same and only the platform underneath has changed, because anything that breaks is obvious. Redesigning afterwards is cheaper and lower risk once the content model is in place.
What will it cost to run afterwards?
The shape of the bill changes: hosting is usually lower, per-plugin licences mostly disappear, and the CMS may become a subscription. Whether the total is lower depends on your current stack and traffic, so the assessment gives you the figures for your site rather than an average.
Find out what you are actually dealing with.
Most of this work starts with a Headless Assessment. £1,500, fixed. You get the architecture, the risks, and a costed route off WordPress. No obligation to build with us.
No lock-in. No obligation.