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Guide

Migrating from SiteGround to DreamHost

SiteGround renews at 6x its intro rate — $468 over three years against DreamHost's $104. What the move saves, what you give up, and how to migrate from SiteGround to DreamHost without downtime.

ED
Researched by the Host Cliff editorial team Published 28 Jul 2026 · 3 min read · No paid placements
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People decide to migrate from SiteGround to DreamHost in the same week every time: the week the renewal invoice lands. SiteGround's entry plan advertises $2.99/mo and renews at $17.99/mo — 6.0 times the rate that got you in. Over 36 months that is $468, which makes it the most expensive shared host of the sixteen we have reviewed. DreamHost's entry plan is $2.89 renewing at $10.99, and because it locks the intro rate for 36 months rather than 12, the same three years costs $104.

That is a difference of roughly $364, and it is the whole reason this page exists. Both figures were read from each host's own pricing page on the dates shown on our SiteGround review and our DreamHost review.

What you actually give up

This is the part most migration guides skip, so take it first. SiteGround's support is genuinely among the better operations in shared hosting, its custom caching layer is faster than DreamHost's out of the box, and its staging tools on the higher plans are more polished. If you are on SiteGround because someone competent set it up and it has never given you a problem, $364 over three years may not be worth the afternoon and the risk.

What you gain, beyond the money: DreamHost's refund window is 97 days against SiteGround's 30, which is the longest of any host we track, and it means a move you regret is reversible for three months rather than one. DreamHost also migrates the site for you at no charge.

Time the move before the renewal, not after

The single most expensive mistake here is letting the renewal process first. Once a 12-month term renews at $17.99/mo you have paid $215 up front, and SiteGround's 30-day refund covers new accounts rather than renewals. Practically:

  • Find your renewal date in SiteGround's Client Area under Services.
  • Start the move with three to four weeks left. That is comfortably enough for a migration plus DNS propagation, with room for something to go wrong.
  • Turn off auto-renewal only once the new site is live and serving. Turning it off first and then hitting a problem leaves you with an expiring account and no leverage.

The migration, step by step

  1. Buy the DreamHost plan on the term you actually want. The 36-month term is what produces the $104 figure; a 12-month term renews sooner and costs more over the same three years. Our true cost calculator will do the arithmetic for whatever term you are considering.
  2. Request the free migration from the DreamHost panel, or move it yourself: export the database from SiteGround's phpMyAdmin, download the web root over SFTP, and upload both to DreamHost. For WordPress specifically, a plugin-based move is usually less error-prone than a manual one.
  3. Test on the temporary URL DreamHost provides before touching DNS. Check the pages that involve forms, payments or logins — those are what break, not the home page.
  4. Lower your DNS TTL to 300 seconds a day before you switch nameservers. This is the step that turns a multi-hour cutover into a few minutes, and almost nobody does it.
  5. Switch nameservers, then leave SiteGround running for a week. Hosting for two weeks twice over costs a few dollars and is the cheapest insurance available.
  6. Re-issue SSL on DreamHost and confirm the padlock on the live domain, not the temporary one.

The general version of this sequence, with the DNS details expanded, is in how to migrate hosting without downtime.

Is DreamHost the right destination?

It is the cheapest of the mainstream US hosts on our three-year figures, but it is not the cheapest full stop, and "cheapest" is not the only axis. If you want the price never to move at all rather than to move less, Cloudways and Kinsta charge in year two exactly what they charge in month one — they simply start much higher. The full ordering, by what each host actually costs rather than by how big its discount looks, is on our deals page, and SiteGround alternatives lists every reviewed host that beats it on a measure we can show you.

Price it over the term you will actually stay

Every host we track, priced over one to four years, using the renewal rate and how long each intro price is really locked for.

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Next in the series · 10 of 22 Migrating from IONOS to Hostinger IONOS has the steepest renewal we have recorded — $1 becomes $8, an 8x rise after 12 months. What it costs to stay, what Hostinger costs instead, and how to migrate from IONOS to Hostinger safely. 3 min read

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