Best way to change hosts and domain

[mcsg]

What is the best process for moving between 2 different servers and hosts?

We're building the system on HOST.DOMAIN.COM and aim to deploy to PRODUCTION.DOMAIN.COM

Are there tools or best practices to move the data to use the new host? Or is search and replace for the database our best method?

 

[Nathan Explosion]

Define 'Data' - are you referring to file system? Content on the site? Applications? Plugins?

[Kyle F]

Is your current and new host using cPanel? If so you 'could' ask them (the new host) to utilise the "Transfer accounts between servers" feature. For this they'd simply use the IP of the previous host, your account name and password (you could set a temp PW for them to use) and it'd transfer your entire account over. I did this from my old host to my dedicated server running cPanel.

Next you'd then ask the previous host to completely terminate and delete your account from their server (once you have your files and that on the new host), modify the conf_global.php file to change the URL to your new domain. You can then proceed to your IPS Client Area and change your domain URL. You'll receive an email from IPS giving you strict instructions on how to proceed.

[mcsg]

Thanks @Kyle F I am self hosting on AWS servers. I should have been more specific, we're building a new site and content on a separate server and will move the content to the production server when we're ready.

So to answer @Nathan Explosions question, it is content. Like Pages articles where our editors are adding internal links and references to the site, but need to change https://staging.domain.com/news/this-is-an-article --> https://www.domain.com/news/this-is-an-article in all the Editor fields within a database.