Migrate
Bring what you already wrote.
9 sources, three ways in, and nothing lands as a flat pile of posts. Your categories, hierarchy, and ordering come across as structure, because rebuilding an information architecture by hand is the reason most documentation migrations never happen.
How it gets in
Three ways, and one of them needs no export at all.
The first question worth answering is whether you have to export anything. Sometimes you do not.
Straight from your database
If the docs are already in this WordPress install, there is nothing to export. The importer reads the existing post type and taxonomy directly and writes into ours.
weDocs, BetterDocs
Live over the API
Paste a key, pick what to pull, and articles come down over the wire. The credential is used for the request and never written to your database.
Help Scout, Intercom
Upload a ZIP
Any Markdown export works. Sub folders become categories, frontmatter becomes metadata, and ordering is preserved where the source recorded it.
GitBook, ReadMe, Notion, Docusaurus, plain Markdown
Every source
Where you are coming from
Pick yours for the exact steps, what comes across cleanly, and what needs an hour of cleanup.
weDocs
DatabaseReads the hierarchy directly. Root docs become products, sections become categories, articles become docs.
How to migrate
BetterDocs
DatabaseEvery doc category term is created or reused by slug, with title, content, excerpt, and menu order carried across.
How to migrate
Help Scout
APIPulls collections, categories, and articles from the Docs API. Filter to one collection if you only want part of it.
How to migrate
Intercom
APIFetches Help Center collections and articles with an access token. Bodies are already HTML, so formatting arrives intact.
How to migrate
GitBook
ZIPExport as Markdown and upload the archive. Folder structure maps to categories as it appeared in your sidebar.
How to migrate
ReadMe
ZIPThe official ReadMe.io export is read directly, with title, slug, and order frontmatter honoured.
How to migrate
Notion
ZIPBoth the Markdown and CSV export formats work. Nested pages become nested categories rather than a flat list.
How to migrate
Docusaurus
ZIPZip the docs folder. MDX is handled alongside Markdown, and category json sets folder labels and order.
How to migrate
Plain Markdown
ZIPAnything else that produces Markdown. Sub folders become categories and frontmatter is read if present.
How to migrateStructure
Your hierarchy survives the trip
Every source has its own words for the same three levels. Nothing arrives as a flat list of posts you then have to reorganise by hand.
| Source | Product | Category | Doc |
|---|---|---|---|
| weDocs | Root doc | Section | Article |
| BetterDocs | Knowledge base | Doc category | Doc |
| Help Scout | Collection | Category | Article |
| Intercom | You choose | Collection | Article |
| Markdown ZIP | You choose | Sub folder | File |
getting-started/
intro.md
quickstart.md
api-reference/
auth.md
errors.md
Sub folders become categories, files become docs.
Before you start
What lands, and what needs an hour
Being upfront about the second column is cheaper for both of us than you finding out afterwards.
Comes across automatically
- Titles, body content, and excerpts
- Category structure and nesting
- Menu order and sidebar position
- Draft and published states
- Frontmatter metadata, where the source wrote it
- Inline formatting, links, and code blocks
Plan for these
- Images are not rehosted. Imported content keeps pointing at your old host. Move them to your media library before retiring the old site.
- Redirects are not created. Old URLs will not forward, so set up 301s if the previous docs ranked.
- Versions start fresh. Historical version trees are not reconstructed from the source.
The process
Four steps, and you can undo all of them
Nothing in your source is modified, and nothing goes live until you say so. A failed first attempt costs you nothing but the time.
Pick your source
Database importers detect existing data on their own. API and ZIP importers ask for a key or a file.
Choose a destination
Point the import at a new or existing product, and filter to a single collection if you only want part of it.
Import as drafts
Bring everything in unpublished so nothing goes live before you have looked at it.
Review, then publish
Fix image URLs, check the navigation, run the content health scan, and publish when it looks right.
Next step
Not sure yours will come across cleanly?
Send us a sample export before you buy and we will tell you straight. There is a 14 day money back guarantee behind it either way.
Imports arrive unpublished, and nothing in your source is modified
