What is a site move, and how do you do it?

Moving a site refers to migrating it to a new address (URL). This may be necessary when you:

• Change your site's domain name. For example, from example.com to sample.com.

• Change your site's top-level domain. For example, from example.com to example.ru.

• Add www to an address or remove this prefix from it. For example, if you're switching from www.example.com to example.com.

• Switch from HTTP to HTTPS or vice versa. For example, from http://example.com to https://example.com.

In all these cases, Yandex considers each address a different site. Such sites can be included in search separately from each other and compete with each other in search results. To avoid this, set up redirection to your primary site address.

If a site is included in the search both with and without www, Yandex can select your primary address automatically. Only this address will be included in the search results.

Learn more:

• Primary and alternate site addresses

How to migrate from one URL to another

Here's a basic scenario for moving a site:

1. Add both site URLs to Yandex Webmaster and verify your ownership for both of them. For example, add http://example.com and https://example.com. If one of these addresses has already been added to the service, add and verify the other one.

2. Check that the site is accessible at the new address.

3. Set up redirection from the old URL to the new one.

4. In Yandex Webmaster, go to Indexing → Relocate site and submit a move request. This will help you speed up migration and identify potential errors.

Learn more about specific scenarios:

• Moving a site to a new domain name

• Moving a website to an address with the www prefix and back

• Switching a site to HTTPS

• How do I leave the HTTP version of the site available?

• How to make HTTP and HTTPS versions of the site available

• Setup instructions for popular site platforms

How to check the migration results

To find out which pages have been moved or are still indexed at the old address:

1. In Yandex Webmaster, specify your site using its new or old address.

2. Go to Indexing → Searchable pages.

Pages at the old address will gradually disappear and move to the new address.

Learn more:

• Searchable pages

Ungrouping sites

Ungrouping refers to separating a site's primary address from its alternate address. You can ungroup sites that were grouped when switching between the HTTP and HTTPS protocols or adding or removing the www prefix.

To ungroup sites, remove redirects and submit an ungrouping request under Indexing → Ungrouping site addresses (to speed up the process). In Yandex Webmaster, specify the site hosted at the alternate address.

You can check whether ungrouping was successful the same way as you check the migration results: go to Indexing → Searchable pages to see the status of each ungrouped address individually.

Learn more:

• Ungrouping sites