Can I Build a New Website on Local using a Domain that's already in Use on the Web?

So in the case that I plan to completely rebuild someone’s WP site, yet I am not ready to take down the current one, How do I set up a WP environment on Flywheel? Am I putting that same domain name on there or is there a way to change it to that domain name when I’m done? Sorry for what is probably the stupidest question in the world but I really don’t know the answer.

Thank you!!!

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Hi there,

There aren’t any stupid questions :). In local you create a website with the adres domain.local and the Local software will change your hosts file for you. When you are done you can migrate that website to flywheel with a push of a button and flywheel will change the “domain.local” to “domain.com” for you.

If you host with an other hosting provider, you can simply copy all files to the root, export the database and import it to another database. Change the database access data in wp-config.php and use WP cli to replace “domain.local” to “domain.com”. Or if you don’t have SSH access use Database search & replace script from interconnect.

Good luck!

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