Leaving a website builder is often harder than joining one. These pages say plainly what each platform lets you take with you. Use them whether or not you ever work with us.

Somewhere else? Tell us the address. We'll look at your site and tell you what can come with you, before we talk about money.

Your design usually stays behind

Your words are yours. Your photographs are yours. Your design usually is not. The template, the platform's stock photography, its fonts and its layout system belong to the platform, and none of them travel with you no matter which export button you press.

This often surprises people, because the design is the part that feels most like the site. You can take everything you're entitled to, open it somewhere else, and find it doesn't look like your website. That isn't a fault in the export.

Three things to do before you move

1. Write down every page address you have

Every old address needs a permanent redirect to wherever that page ends up. Search engines keep your ranking through a move with proper redirects, and can lose it without them. Do this first. Rebuilding the list from a site that's already gone is much harder.

2. Get your images at full size, not at the size the page shows

Builders serve resized copies, so what you see in the browser is often not what you uploaded. Find the originals on your own computer if you still have them. If you don't, download the largest version the platform will give you, and do it before you cancel anything.

3. Check who actually holds your domain

If you registered your domain through the builder, it's still yours and you can move it. Expect a wait: a domain registered or transferred in the last sixty days is usually locked from transferring again. That's an industry rule, not your platform's choice.

Don't cancel anything yet

Keep your old plan until the new site is live. Most sites go offline as soon as the plan ends. Pay for one more month to be safe.