Impact of Changing Web Hosting on SEO According to Google's Gary Illyes

What Changing Your Website Host Involves

Switching web hosting platforms can be a cause for concern when it comes to your website's rankings and SEO. This is because the process of migrating a site to a new host includes various technical aspects that, if not handled properly, can lead to immediate negative consequences.

Migrating to a new web host may seem daunting, but if your site is a standard WordPress site, the process can be relatively simple, especially with the help of plugins.

Even if you prefer a manual migration, it's not too challenging if you are comfortable managing website databases with tools such as phpMyAdmin and are familiar with using SFTP software.

Gary Ilyes’ answer refers to doing it “by the book” which is actually quite a lot and can be overwhelming if you’ve never done this before.

Does Changing Website Hosting Affect SEO?

The question that was asked is:

“My company is considering switching hosts for our website. Would switching have a negative and lasting effect on our SEO rankings?”

Changing hosts for your website should not harm your Google search rankings as long as you follow the proper procedures. According to Google's Gary Illyes, if you handle the transition correctly by ensuring your website remains accessible and downtime is kept to a minimum, your pages' rankings should not be negatively impacted.

Two Considerations When Changing Web Hosting

When considering switching to a new web host, it's important to keep in mind that the quality of the new host may not be the same as the old one. If you downgrade your web hosting, you may experience some negative consequences, ranging from minor issues to more significant problems.

Gary mentioned two factors to be mindful of:

Website domain resolves

Downtime is minimal

1. Website Is Resolvable

When making changes to the domain name settings, downtime is kept to a minimum.

Believe it or not, your website can be offline for weeks without permanently losing its rankings. I speak from personal experience of running websites for 25 years. There were instances when my websites faced downtime due to hard drive failures at the web host, incorrect settings leading to 500 errors, and the need to take a website offline to address hacked files.

In my experience, a website can bounce back from weeks of downtime. It usually takes a couple of weeks for Google to recrawl and reindex all the webpages, ensuring they appear in the search engine results pages (SERPs) again.

Listen to the answer on YouTube at the 7:58 minute mark:

Featured Image by Shutterstock/New Africa

Editor's P/S:

Migrating to a new web host can evoke concerns about SEO repercussions, but following best practices can mitigate risks. By ensuring minimal downtime and proper redirection, you can maintain your rankings. However, it's crucial to evaluate the quality of the new host, as downgrading may lead to performance issues.

Remember, even prolonged downtime doesn't necessarily result in permanent ranking loss. Google's recrawling process allows websites to recover over time. As an experienced web developer, I've witnessed websites bouncing back from weeks of downtime. It may take a few weeks for reindexing, but your pages will eventually reappear in search results.