If you have a website still running on HTTP you need to migrate it to HTTPS as most web browsers mark a site still running on HTTP as not secure and that can have a negative effect on your website traffic.
In this video we break down the process of migrating from HTTP to HTTPS and offer two methods that you can use to make the move as smooth as possible.
🔗 Link to article with step-by-step instructions and the code for the second method https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/how-to-add-ssl-and-https-in-wordpress/
🔗 Link to buy SSL https://www.domain.com/security/ssl-certificate
🔗 Here is how you can use an FTP client to access your website files https://www.wpbeginner.com/beginners-guide/how-to-use-ftp-to-upload-files-to-wordpress-for-beginners/
Chapters
00:00 Introduction
00:45 How to Find Out if You Are on HTTP or HTTPS
01:27 How to Install an SSL Certificate on Your Website
02:55 Setup SSL/HTTPS in WordPress Using a Plugin
05:13 Setup SSL/HTTPS in WordPress Manually
11:16 Submit Your HTTPS Site to Google Search Console
Top Resources
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►Best WordPress Analytics Plugin https://www.monsterinsights.com/
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►WordPress Tutorial – How to Make a WordPress Website for Beginners https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvbFBxKcORA
►WordPress Gutenberg Tutorial: How to Easily Work With the Block Editor https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjfrzGeB5_g
►What is SEO and How Does it Work? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjfrzGeB5_g
►How to Install a WordPress Theme https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIPQRQLAz90
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Hey what's up everyone if your website Isn't using https and doesn't have an SSL certificate installed you really Should consider moving from HTTP to Https and the reason for this is that Https is so much more secure for your Site visitors and because of that most Modern web browsers Mark a site using HTTP as not secure And also let those visitors know that The connection is not private and you Will know if you've ever visited a site And seen one of these messages how Off-putting it can be and you pretty Much go back to the search engine and Look for a similar site I'm sure you can Imagine the kind of damage that will do To your website traffic and if it's a Business website what kind of damage That could do to your business as well So something we definitely want to get Sorted out so let's now take a look at How we find out if our website is using HTTP or https so here we are on Bluehost Website and as you can see if you come Up to the website address bar right here You can see a little padlock right there And if you click on it it will tell you That this connection is secure so any Site that has a little padlock like that Next to it has an SSL certificate Installed and has a secure connection if You see anything that says not secure There or a warning sign at all next to
The website address then that most Likely is not a secure connection and is Running on HTTP not https if your Website is using HTTP please don't worry Because in this video we're going to Show you two methods that can help you Move from HTTP to https Let's Jump Right In so the first thing We need to do in this video is install An SSL certificate on our site now many Great hosting providers actually give You a free SSL certificate when you Start a website with them so it's best To double check with your hosting Provider and see if you've got that in Place already for this example I'm just Going to show you with Bluehost where You can find your SSL certificate and How you can turn it on so I've logged Into my Bluehost account I'm just going To head over to my sites and I'm going To manage the site that I want the SSL Certificate on if I head to the security Tab up here and just click on that so we Can see right here that we have got an SSL certificate right here but we Haven't got it switched on so all we Need to do with Bluehost is toggle this From off to on And now we can see that that's on and It's also forcing https on all of our Pages so that's in the back end on the WordPress dashboard and across the site So what do we do if we don't actually
Have a free SSL certificate with our Hosting the best thing you could do the Method that we actually recommend is Head to a website called domain.com now This is domain.com and it offers a lot Of different things but if you head up To the security tab up here you'll see That they offer SSL certificates if you Click on that you'll then see the Different SSL certificates they offer And all you have to do is just go ahead And purchase one of those for your Website once you purchase an SSL Certificate you'll then need to go back To your hosting provider and ask them to Install it on your website once you've Done all that and got an SSL certificate In place and installed on your website We can then head to our WordPress Dashboard and follow the next step so Now we've got the SSL certificate Installed on our website with our Hosting we can now look at the first of Two methods to get the SSL certificate Working with WordPress our first method Is a recommended method for any beginner Because it's a super easy method and all You have to do is install one plugin Called really simple SSL and that'll Take care of everything for you so as I Said all we need to do is install a Plugin so we're going to head over to Plugins here on the left hand side hover Over that and then click on add new
We're going to head up here to the top Right and in the search bar just type Really simple SSL it's enter once you've Added that and the first option right Here really simple SSL is the one we Want so we're just going to click Install now and that's now installing Once it's installed we can click the Activate button there as you can see This is the really simple SSL dashboard And the first thing that we can see here Is SSL is not yet enabled on this site So all we need to do is click the Activate SSL button right here and That'll take care of that so this pop-up Is just telling us that we're ready to Migrate to SSL and it's giving us a Little bit of information about what's Going to happen it's also letting us Know it's detected and SSL certificate The one that we've installed on the Website so all we need to do then is Just click the activate SSL button and Here we get a little success message Saying thanks for updating and we can See the SSL has been activated on the Site the really simple SSL plugin has a Ton more features that come with it as Well so there are recommendations that It could give you to improve website Security and things like that on your Website all I'm going to do is Click go To dashboard right here and we can see That there's here are some of the
Recommendations and you can go ahead if You want to and fix those Recommendations but for this video all We wanted to do was migrate from HTTP to Https for our WordPress site and we've Done that with this plugin so we're just Going to check that on our website we're Going to head up here click on that as You can see everything is working on the Site I can see all the images as well so What really simple SSL is doing is Basically covering everything from Migrating from HTTP to https in WordPress but also any mixed content Errors as well is taking care of them so If any of these images have a HTTP link To them really simple SSL is doing all The heavy lifting and changing those Links for us to https in the background So we recommend keeping really simple SSL active on your site all the time to Make sure everything runs smoothly so Now we're going to take a look at our Second method and because our second Method is a manual method it is a little Bit more involved but it does offer a More performance optimized solution so If that's something you're looking for This method is definitely for you let's Do it so as I said the second method is A little bit more involved and is Probably more suited to a more Intermediate to Advanced user of WordPress or someone that's used to
Copying and pasting code into the Htaccess file or the wp config file as Well and being able to access them so if You're not comfortable with any of the Steps that I show you in this method Then choose method one as that's the Recommended method for beginners so the First thing we need to do on this Website to migrate our WordPress site From HTTP to https in this method is Head to settings right here and then Click on General and now we're under the General settings we can see that a WordPress address URL and our site Address URL LR HTTP both of them all we Need to do is add the s in there and Change them to https once we've done That we head down here and just click on Save changes after that you know that's Been successful when WordPress logs you Out of the site so then we have to add a Few bits of code to our HD access file To then divert our site from HTTP to Https and to do that I'm going to be Using the file manager on my Bluehost Posting panel and you should be able to Access a file manager on your hosting Panel too if you don't have access to That then you can use a FTP client like Filezilla or something like that to Access your WordPress files so right now I'm just going to log into my Bluehost Hosting panel and now that I'm in my Bluehost hosting panel I'm just going to
Head to Advanced down here and click on That and then I'm going to click on the File manager right here under the files Section so now I'm in the file manager For my website and I can see that I've Got all my WordPress files right here Just make sure you're in the root folder Of your website so the file that we want To change right here is the htx's fault Right there what I recommend you do is Right click on that file and download it Before you make any changes then I'm Going to right click it again and then Click on edit It's going to give me a little bit of a Warning here to back up the file before We make any changes I've done that so I'm just going to click on the edit Button right there so here we can see We're in the editor for a HD access file And all we need to do is paste a bit of Code in here I've popped a link in the Description below to the article that Goes with this video and if you head to That article which is right here And scroll down You'll find this section right here Which is the bit that we need to paste Into our HD access file so all we need To do is copy this bit of code head to Our file manager and paste in our bit of Code there once you've added that code In you can click save changes up here in The top right
Back in the file manager here We also recommend that you do this step As well just to force https in areas Like the admin panel the dashboard Things like that so to do that all you Need to do is head to your WP config File right here which is just below Where the HD access file is right click On that download it just to back that File up as well and then right click on That and click on edit it's also going To give you another warning just to make Sure that you downloaded that just in Case click the little edit button there To edit that file so all we need to do Is scroll down to the bottom of this File and just before the that's all stop Editing we're just going to make a Little bit of space here we're going to Paste in a line of code from the article As well so heading back over to the Article we can see there's this bit of Code here to paste into the wp config File so we're just going to copy that Head back over to the editor and paste That in here once you've pasted that in There click on Save changes at the top Right and that will save those changes So once you've done all that you should See the little pad lock up where the URL Is that will let you know that your site Is now fully migrated over to https from HTTP with this method there is the Possibility of mixed content errors
Throughout your site so to stop that Happening all you need to do is install A plugin called better search and Replace so we're going to head over to Plugins here on the left hand side hover Over that and then click on add new and Then up here in the top right just type In better search this is the plugin we Want right here it's by delicious brains And it's got over 1 million Active Installation so we know it's a trusted Plugin so we're just going to click on The install now button and then the Activate Button as well so once that's Plugins activated just head over to Tools here on the left hand side hover Over that and you'll see better search And replace this right here just click On that so with better search and Replace what we're going to do is we're Going to get rid of all those mixed Content errors that we would get from The migration from HTTP to https by Searching for any of the original HTTP Links or URLs throughout that database Space uploads images Etc and replacing Them with the https URL as it is now so To do that all we need to do is just Copy the URL of your website and paste That in just make sure you remove the Https for the search for so basically We're searching for the HTTP version of Our site right there and then we're Going to replace it with the version
That we have currently https and then It's advised that we select all of our Tables we're going to click the top one And then we go all the way to the bottom Holden shift and click the bottom one as Well that selected all the tables and Then we're going to uncheck this box Right here scroll down a little bit And then run search and replace just Click that button right there so once That's done it gives you a little note Right here to let us know what exactly Was done during that process we can find Out more details here if we want but as Far as this method goes we've now Migrated our website over to https and We have fixed all those mixed content Errors that we would find with our Website if you do find that you have any Issues with this process then we totally Recommend that you you install the Really simple SSL plugin to handle all Of the issues that you may face at this Point so the final thing we recommend Doing in this video is adding your new Website URL to your Google search Console and the reason we recommend Doing this is because Google Sees HTTP And https as two different websites so You may have the HTTP website already Added to your Google search console you Need to add your https site as well so For me I'm just going to add it to the URL prefix right here because mine's a
Sub domain just going to add it right There and then click on continue so once You see this pop-up it's to verify the Ownership of the site all you need to do Is download this file right here and Save that to your computer then head to Your file manager for your website make Sure you're in the root folder of your Website and all you need to do is upload The file click on upload up here I'm Going to select the file so there it's Uploaded the file Go back and just check that that file is In there so yeah that's a files right There if you head back to Google and Then once you're back on your Google Search console just click the verify Button right there may take a minute to Verify that you own that site once it's Verified it'll let you know that Ownership is verified and you can then Go to your property and there you can See that it has added the https version Of your site to your Google search Console so that's it for this video if You found this video helpful let us know In the comments below and make sure you Subscribe to our channel for the more Video content that helps you out with Your WordPress site here's a couple of Videos you might want to check out next Thanks for watching
