How to Migrate a cPanel Account Between Servers Using WHM Transfer Tool

Whether you’re moving a client to a bigger reseller package, consolidating servers, or migrating to a new provider, WHM’s Transfer Tool moves a complete cPanel account — files, databases, email, DNS zone, and settings — as a single unit.

Before you start

Confirm you have WHM (root or reseller) access on both the source and destination servers, and that the destination has enough free resources to receive the account. It’s also worth confirming the destination server’s IP in advance, since you’ll likely need to update DNS once the transfer completes.

Running a transfer

1. On the destination server’s WHM, go to Transfers > Transfer Tool (or Copy Accounts / Transfer Accounts, depending on your setup).
2. Enter the source server’s hostname/IP and root (or reseller) credentials.
3. Select the account(s) you want to transfer from the list WHM retrieves.
4. Choose whether to also copy the account’s DNS zone, and whether to remove it from the source server automatically once the transfer succeeds.
5. Start the transfer — WHM packages the account (essentially a full cPanel backup) and restores it on the destination automatically.

What happens to DNS

The transfer moves the account’s files and databases, but the domain’s DNS still needs to point at the new server once you’re ready to cut over — either by updating an A record, or (if nameservers are managed elsewhere) waiting for you to update them. Keep the account live on both servers briefly during this window if possible, so nothing breaks mid-propagation.

Verifying before cutover

Before changing DNS, test the migrated site on the destination server directly (via a temporary hosts-file edit on your own machine, or the server’s IP with a Host header) to confirm the site, database connections, and email all work correctly on the new server first.

After cutover

Once DNS has fully propagated to the new server, confirm mail delivery and site functionality one more time, then remove the account from the old server (if the transfer didn’t do this automatically) to avoid confusion or duplicate resource usage.