How to Transfer Content easily from Contentful to WordPress
Migrating your site from Contentful to WordPress might sound intimidating, especially if you have hundreds of articles, images, and custom fields to handle. However, with a clear plan, the right tools, and best practices, you can transfer content smoothly and avoid unnecessary headaches. In this guide, you’ll learn how to manage a Contentful to WordPress migration step-by-step, ensuring your new site works flawlessly while preserving SEO and content quality.
Why Move from Contentful to WordPress
Contentful is a popular headless CMS that developers love because it provides an API-first way to deliver content to websites, apps, and other digital products. But for editors, marketers, and bloggers, Contentful can feel too technical. Many everyday tasks require developer support, from tweaking page layouts to adding SEO fields.
WordPress, on the other hand, is the most widely used CMS in the world. It combines an intuitive editing experience with a huge library of plugins and themes. For teams wanting to simplify their content management and take more control, migrating from Contentful to WordPress can be a smart choice.
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Step 1: Take Inventory of Your Content
Before you start moving content, do a thorough audit of your existing Contentful setup. Identify your content types, fields, and any media assets you’ll need. Make a list of your key content structures such as blog posts, landing pages, testimonials, and image galleries.
Organize this information in a spreadsheet. This makes it easier to match Contentful data to equivalent structures in WordPress. Planning your mapping in advance prevents confusion later when you import the content.
Step 2: Backup Everything
Never start a migration without creating backups. Use Contentful’s CLI or Content Management API to export all entries and assets as JSON files. Save these backups in multiple places: locally and in cloud storage.
Also, back up your existing Contentful front end if you plan to reuse any design elements, images, or custom code snippets.
Step 3: Prepare Your New WordPress Site
Next, choose a reliable hosting provider that specializes in WordPress. Top providers like SiteGround, Bluehost, or WP Engine make setup easy and provide performance and security enhancements.
Install a fresh copy of WordPress on your hosting account. Then, pick a theme that suits your brand or replicates your previous design. If your Contentful site used a custom front end, you may choose to redesign using a page builder like Elementor or Gutenberg blocks.
Step 4: Install Essential Plugins
For a smooth Contentful to WordPress migration, a few plugins are vital:
WP All Import: This plugin helps import data from CSV, XML, or JSON files. It allows you to map imported data to posts, pages, custom post types, and custom fields.
Advanced Custom Fields (ACF): Use this to recreate any special fields you had in Contentful.
Custom Post Type UI: Handy for creating custom post types that match your old content structure.
Yoast SEO or Rank Math: Helps manage SEO metadata for your imported content.
Step 5: Import Your Content
With your tools ready, it’s time to import your data. If you exported your Contentful data in JSON format, convert it to a CSV if needed. WP All Import supports both formats, but many users find CSV easier to handle for large sets of data.
In WP All Import, create a new import, upload your file, and match fields from Contentful to WordPress equivalents. For example, map Contentful’s title to the WordPress post title and Contentful’s body field to the WordPress content editor.
Run a test import first with a small batch to check that everything appears correctly. Once you’re confident, import the full dataset.
Step 6: Bring Over Images and Media
Contentful stores images separately and serves them through a CDN. This means you need to download your images and upload them to WordPress’s Media Library.
Use a bulk image downloader or the Contentful CLI to get your assets. Then, a plugin like Media Tools or WP All Import’s image import feature can automatically match image URLs in your content with images in the Media Library.
Check your pages and posts afterward to ensure images display properly and are optimized for web performance.
Step 7: Recreate Menus and Widgets
After your posts and pages are in WordPress, rebuild your site navigation. Create menus that match your previous site’s structure so visitors can easily find content.
Add or configure widgets if your theme supports sidebars or footer widget areas. Many Contentful sites use custom layouts, so you may need to replicate these using blocks or page builder widgets.
Step 8: Test Everything Thoroughly
Before going live, test your new site from top to bottom. Check pages for formatting issues, broken links, and missing images. Test forms, comment sections, search functionality, and mobile responsiveness.
Tools like Broken Link Checker can help find bad links fast. This testing phase ensures visitors won’t encounter problems after launch.
Step 9: Set Up SEO and Redirects
Protect your search rankings by matching your old URLs as closely as possible. If any URLs change, use a plugin like Redirection to set up 301 redirects from old Contentful URLs to the new WordPress ones.
Set up an SEO plugin like Yoast SEO or Rank Math to manage meta descriptions, sitemaps, and schema markup. Submit your new sitemap to Google Search Console to get your pages reindexed quickly.
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Step 10: Launch and Monitor
Once testing is complete, update your DNS to point your domain to the new WordPress site. It may take a few hours for DNS changes to fully propagate.
Keep monitoring your site’s performance, traffic, and error logs for a few days after launch. Be ready to fix any unexpected issues immediately.
Final Thoughts
Moving from Contentful to WordPress doesn’t have to be difficult if you take it step-by-step. By auditing your content, using powerful import tools, and planning your site structure carefully, you can enjoy a faster, easier-to-manage site that empowers your team to create and grow without constant developer help. With good preparation, your migration will be smooth and set you up for long-term success.