Blogger To WordPress Migration Guide (2025)
Google changed how Blogger exports content a while back, which broke the old direct “Backup Content → Import into WordPress” workflow many tutorials still describe. The old export still works between two Blogger sites, but importing that same file straight into WordPress no longer functions the way it used to. Here’s the current, working method: exporting via Google Takeout and importing through your Blogger site’s RSS feed using a WordPress feed-import plugin.
The Short Version
- Blogger’s classic “Backup Content” export XML no longer imports directly and cleanly into WordPress
- The reliable current method uses your Blogger site’s RSS feed URL with a WordPress feed-import plugin
- This approach transfers post titles, content, and publish dates, but images and formatting are worth checking manually afterward
- Set the feed’s item limit high enough (200–1,000+) to capture your entire post history in one pass
Why the Old Method Stopped Working
Blogger’s Settings → Backup Content option still exists and still produces an XML export file — but that file format is designed for restoring content into another Blogger site, not for a clean WordPress import. If you specifically want a full account-level export including images and other data, Google Takeout (takeout.google.com) lets you export your Blogger data in bulk, though the more practical path for actually getting posts into WordPress is the RSS feed method below.
Step 1: Find Your Blogger RSS Feed URL
Every Blogger site has a default RSS feed at a predictable URL pattern: yourblogname.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default. This feed lists your published posts and is what a WordPress feed-import plugin will read from.
Step 2: Install a Feed Import Plugin on WordPress
On your destination WordPress site, install a feed-fetching plugin (RSS Feed Fetcher-style plugins are built for exactly this — pulling external feed content in as WordPress posts). Once activated, you’ll create a new import “campaign” pointed at your Blogger feed URL.
Step 3: Configure the Import Campaign
A few settings matter more than the rest for a clean migration:
- Feed URL — paste your Blogger feed address (the
/feeds/posts/defaultURL) - Maximum items to fetch — set this high enough to cover your full post history (200, or 1,000+ for a larger blog) so nothing gets left behind
- Use feed item date — enable this so imported posts keep their original publish dates instead of showing today’s date
- Convert character encoding to UTF-8 — prevents special characters and accented letters from displaying incorrectly
- Copy the permalink from the source — preserves your original URL slugs, which matters for keeping any existing search rankings and backlinks intact
- Post type and author — set the imported content to publish as standard Posts, and assign the correct author account
- Comments setting — choose whether to open comments on the imported posts or leave them closed
Save the campaign, then run it — most plugins show an “Importing content” progress indicator, and larger blogs take longer depending on how many posts are being pulled in.
Step 4: Verify the Import
Once the import finishes, check your WordPress Posts list to confirm everything came through — refresh the page if newly imported posts don’t appear immediately. Spot-check a handful of posts (especially older ones and any with embedded images) for formatting issues, since feed-based imports occasionally need manual cleanup on image placement or embedded content that didn’t transfer perfectly.
What This Method Doesn’t Handle Perfectly
| Content Type | How Well It Transfers |
|---|---|
| Post titles and body text | Reliable |
| Publish dates | Reliable, if “use feed item date” is enabled |
| Images hosted on Blogger’s own servers | Often transfers, but worth spot-checking — some images may need re-uploading |
| Comments | Not transferred — comments stay on the original Blogger post unless manually migrated separately |
| Blogger-specific widgets/gadgets | Not transferred — these are Blogger template features with no WordPress equivalent |
After the Import: Setting Up 301 Redirects
Importing content is only half the migration. If your Blogger URLs cannot map cleanly to your new WordPress permalinks, every inbound link and every search ranking pointing at your old Blogger URLs is at risk without redirects in place:
- Export a full list of your existing Blogger post URLs before shutting down or repointing the Blogger domain, using Blogger’s sitemap.xml or a crawler tool, so you have a complete reference list.
- Match each old URL to its new WordPress equivalent — this is manual, tedious work for a large blog, but skipping it means losing accumulated search rankings for every unredirected post.
- Set up 301 (permanent) redirects, not 302s, using a plugin like Redirection (free) or your SEO plugin’s built-in redirect manager (Rank Math and Yoast both include one) — 301s tell search engines the move is permanent and transfer most of the original page’s ranking signal.
- Test a sample of redirects manually after setup by visiting several old URLs directly and confirming they land on the correct new page, not a generic 404 or homepage redirect.
What to Check Before Calling the Migration Done
- Internal links between your own posts — links you wrote pointing from one of your Blogger posts to another need updating to the new WordPress URLs; the import does not rewrite these automatically.
- Embedded images hosted on Blogger’s own image servers — depending on the import method, images may still be hot-linked back to Blogger’s servers rather than actually copied into your WordPress media library, which becomes a problem if you later shut down the Blogger account.
- Categories and tags — Blogger’s “Labels” do not always map cleanly to WordPress categories vs. tags; review how the import mapped these and reorganize if the structure came through messy.
- Search Console setup — submit your new WordPress sitemap to Google Search Console and monitor the Indexing report over the following weeks to catch any pages that failed to transfer their ranking properly.
Should I migrate my Blogger custom domain or start fresh on WordPress?
Keeping your existing custom domain is almost always the better choice if you already have search rankings and backlinks built up — a domain change on top of a platform change compounds the SEO risk of the migration. Point your existing domain’s DNS at your new WordPress hosting instead of registering a new domain, so accumulated authority carries forward.
How long does it typically take Google to fully re-crawl a migrated site?
This varies by site size and crawl budget, but expect weeks rather than days for a full re-crawl of a substantial archive, even with redirects properly in place and a fresh sitemap submitted. Monitor Search Console’s Indexing report during this window rather than assuming an overnight switch — some temporary ranking fluctuation during the transition is normal.
Do I need to keep my Blogger account active after migrating?
Keep it active, even set to private, for at least a few months after migration rather than deleting it immediately. This gives you a fallback if you discover missed content or broken redirects, and if any images are still hot-linked from Blogger’s servers rather than fully copied over, deleting the account early would break those images site-wide.
Frequently Asked Questions
Will this preserve my original post URLs?
Enabling “copy the permalink from the source” during setup keeps your original slug structure, which matters if you want to preserve existing search rankings and avoid broken external backlinks after migrating.
Does this transfer my Blogger comments too?
No — the RSS feed method only pulls post content, not comments. Migrating comments requires a separate, more involved process and isn’t handled by this method.
Why did my older posts show today’s date instead of their original date?
This happens when “use feed item date” isn’t enabled during setup — without it, imported posts default to the import date rather than their original Blogger publish date.
Is there a limit to how many posts I can import at once?
The limit is whatever you set as the maximum items to fetch — for a blog with hundreds of posts, set this well above your total post count so nothing gets cut off.
Should I set up redirects after migrating?
Yes, strongly recommended — once your WordPress site is live, set up 301 redirects from your old Blogger URLs to the matching new WordPress URLs, which preserves SEO value and prevents visitors from hitting dead links from old bookmarks or search results.
The Bottom Line
Blogger no longer supports a clean one-click export into WordPress, but the RSS feed import method is a reliable current workaround for moving your post content over. Budget time afterward to spot-check images and formatting, and don’t skip setting up redirects once your new WordPress site is live.
