Migrating from WordPress to Sanity: why and how to move your business website

WordPress runs 39.5% of all websites, according to W3Techs. It is a fine place to start. But plenty of businesses outgrow it: a growing pile of plugins to keep patched, a page builder nobody quite trusts, and a developer needed for every new page.

If that sounds familiar, moving to Sanity fixes both problems, and it is smoother than it sounds. Below is why we recommend it, and the step-by-step way to migrate, using a real example: we moved ProEd from WordPress to Sanity, carried over 68 pages and its full blog, and launched on 20 August 2026.

Key takeaways

• WordPress is a starting point, not a forever home. Plugins add risk, and page builders tie your content to one design.
• Sanity stores content as structured data, so your team edits content and the design takes care of itself.
• Migration is a content project first. Model your content, import what is worth keeping, and rebuild the pages that matter.
• SEO is protected by planning, not by luck: one-to-one redirects, a new sitemap and close monitoring.
• Sanity is our go-to CMS. ProEd, Quantum Pathways and Shoora Partners all run on it, and so does this website.

Signs your business has outgrown WordPress

• Every new page needs a developer. Your team can edit text, but a new service, programme or landing page means a ticket and a wait.
• Your plugin list keeps growing. Each one is code from a different developer, on a different update schedule.
• Forms, payments or integrations fail quietly. Something breaks after an update, and you only find out when a customer tells you.
• The page builder is fighting you. Content and layout are tangled together, so a redesign means rebuilding every page.

ProEd had all four. On its old WordPress site, form submissions did not reliably reach admissions, applicants got no confirmation, promo codes failed at checkout, and every new programme page needed a developer. We wrote up the enrolment fixes in full.

Plugins are also where WordPress security risk lives. Patchstack found that 91% of new WordPress vulnerabilities in 2025 were in plugins, as we covered in what 11,334 new WordPress vulnerabilities mean for your site.

What is Sanity CMS?

Sanity is a headless CMS. In plain English, your content lives in one place and your website design lives in another. Your team writes and organises content; the website decides how it looks. Change the design later and the content comes with you, untouched.

Editors work in Sanity Studio, which Sanity describes as an “open-source, real-time collaborative content workbench”. Because it is configured in code, it can be shaped around your business: a programme, a service or a property gets its own form with exactly the fields it needs, and nothing it does not.

Rich text is stored as Portable Text, “an open specification for structured block content” that is “stored as JSON and renderable anywhere”. That is a technical way of saying your content is not locked to one website, one template or one page builder.

Sanity vs WordPress for a business website

Not sure which side of that table your site is on? In a free website audit we look at it together on a live screen-share and tell you what we would fix first, whether you migrate or not.

How to migrate from WordPress to Sanity

Migrating might sound daunting. Done in this order, it is a well-trodden path. Here is the process we followed for ProEd.

1. Benchmark before you touch anything

Record every page’s rankings, traffic and backlinks first, so you know what to protect and can spot a drop after launch. For ProEd that meant an SEO audit of all 68 pages and the blog.

2. Model your content first

Decide what your content actually is before moving any of it. For ProEd that meant programmes, plans per programme, blog posts and the pages around them, each as its own type with its own fields. This is the step that later lets editors publish without a developer.

3. Import what is worth keeping, by script

Blog posts are ideal for an automated import. A script reads them from WordPress and converts the HTML into Portable Text, the approach Sanity teaches in its own WordPress migration course. We imported ProEd’s blog this way.

4. Rebuild the pages that matter, by hand

Key pages deserve better than a copy and paste. We rebuilt ProEd’s programme pages and core pages directly in the new content model, so each one is a clean, template-driven page rather than an imported blob of old layout.

5. Build a fast front end

With content in Sanity, the website itself can be built for speed. ProEd’s new site is built with Next.js and hosted on Vercel, reading its content from Sanity, and it is faster than the old WordPress site.

6. Redirect every URL, one to one

Map each old URL to its closest new page and set up permanent 301 redirects, so search engines pass each page’s ranking signals across. Nothing gets dumped on the homepage. We mapped all 68 of ProEd’s pages this way; the full plan is in our ProEd website migration case study.

7. Launch, then watch closely

Submit a new sitemap, verify the site in Google Search Console, and track crawl errors, indexing and rankings against your benchmark for the weeks after launch.

The result for ProEd

• All 68 pages and the full blog moved from WordPress to Sanity, each redirected to its new home.
• Launched on 20 August 2026, ahead of peak enrolment season.
• 70% of organic clicks kept six weeks after changing both platform and domain at once, one of the riskiest moves a site can make.
• A faster site with HubSpot integration, confirmation emails and working promo codes.
• No developer bottleneck. ProEd’s team now publishes new programmes, plans and blog posts themselves.

Why Sanity is our go-to CMS

We recommend Sanity to every client whose website needs to grow, and for good reasons:

• An editing workspace built around your content, not a generic admin with your content squeezed into it.
• Write once, use everywhere. A programme or service is entered once and appears wherever the site needs it.
• Fewer moving parts. Features are built into the site rather than bolted on with plugins you have to keep patching.
• Room to grow. New page types, new languages or a whole redesign without starting your content again.
• You stay in control. Your code, domain and hosting sit in accounts in your name, and handover includes the keys.

It is not just ProEd. Quantum Pathways and Shoora Partners run on Sanity too, and so does the website you are reading.

Is Sanity right for your website?

Honestly, not always. If you need a simple site live this weekend from an off-the-shelf theme, WordPress may suit you better for now. Sanity earns its keep when your content matters to how you win business: services, programmes, locations, products or a blog that brings in enquiries, edited by a team that should not need a developer to publish.

FAQs

Can I migrate from WordPress to Sanity without hurting my SEO?

You can protect most of it with planning: benchmark first, redirect every URL one to one, keep titles and content on your top pages, submit a new sitemap and monitor after launch. The risk is highest when you change domain and platform at once, as ProEd did.

Is Sanity easy for non-technical editors?

Yes, when the Studio is set up around your content. Editors fill in clear forms for each type of page rather than wrestling with layout, which is why ProEd’s team now publishes programmes without a developer.

How long does a WordPress to Sanity migration take?

It depends on how many pages you have, how much content is worth importing, and the integrations involved, such as a CRM or payments. Allow time for the audit and content model before the build starts, and for testing before launch.

Ready to leave WordPress behind?

Lunova Labs designs and builds websites on Sanity, and moves existing WordPress sites across while protecting the rankings they have earned. If you are tired of patching plugins and waiting on a developer, let’s talk about what your site could be. See more of our work.