Can I Change My Domain Name After Registration Bluehost?

Your domain name is one of the most essential parts of your website, it even serves as the location of your website, so without it, people may not be able to locate your site with ease, and Bluehost is a great hosting company to use when it comes to your website hosting and even domain registration.

Can I Change My Domain Name After Registration Bluehost?

Yes, you can change your Bluehost domain name after it has been registered, Bluehost is at your beck and call if you need any assistance in this area. Your domain name can easily be changed if you follow certain steps that would be provided to you by Bluehost, if your account is a shared hosting or VPS hosting or even a dedicated hosting account, then the change is possible.

Changing your domain name is almost like changing the face of your website, in order to do that as smoothly as possible, you will have to do some damage control prior to the change of your domain name.

There are a few things you’ll have to keep in place before you change the domain name, one of the most important things to do is to make sure your files are backed up on your system locally.

You will need to back up your website’s files and database even before storing them in your system, this ensures that you don’t lose any important files and even if you do, you’ll have them backed up and downloaded safe and sound in your computer.

In order to carry out the backup process, you can get help by visiting the backup utility tools in your cPanel for information about creating and downloading backups.You will find the tools helpful, especially if you have no idea what you’re doing.

The only thing you’re changing here is your domain name, so you don’t have to worry about your password, username, files and databases changing, they will stay the same way and your website would be the same, except for the new domain name

Changing your domain name should only be done after serious consideration, you’re letting go of your current domain name in one way of the other, so it is ultimately a decision that shouldn’t be taken lightly and without serious consideration.

Before you contact bluehost, there are certain things you’ll have to keep in mind and certain things you’ll have to make sure of before the primary domain name change happens, this information is important to anyone who intends on changing their domain name.

Things To Look Out For Before The Domain Name Change

The first thing you want to take note of, is that, the entire process of change could happen in twenty five minutes or five hours, it all depends on the kind of account you have. The time range on a domain name change for a shared hosting account can’t be the same for a VPS hosting account.

While your files and database aren’t going to be touched or changed, it is very important that you still create a backup for them and then still download them into your computer, you don’t want to take any chances or risks with your website’s files.

The way the renaming process works is that, your new primary domain will point to the public_html directory itself, the exact way your main domain does currently and you won’t have to worry about any mishap when it comes to that.

If your domain privacy is on, you will have to contact the billing department to end the privacy for that domain, you can’t exactly make changes to a domain that is set to be private, so the privacy mode has to go off.

Any custom domain nameservers you have will be overwritten, your username, password and other files will remain untouched, but your customized DNS will be completely gone and you might have to set a new one after you’ve changed your domain name.

Your decision to change the domain name has to be final, because once you change it, there’s literally no going back. You cannot use the main domain name ever again once it has been changed.

The domain name you intend on changing must be associated or connected to your hosting account, you can’t change a domain name under a separate hosting account. It has to be the domain name linked to the account you’re changing it from.

If you want your site to work after the domain name change, you need to relocate your domain files, files for your new primary domain should go into the public html directory, while files for the previous primary domain should go into a subdirectory of public html.

How To Change Your Bluehost Domain Name

Changing your bluehost domain name isn’t going to be a tasking process, in order to make it happen, you will reach out to bluehost, either through a live chat or through the phone, and you will also have to fill in particular information to make the entire process feasible, the information you’ll need to provide includes:

  • Your primary domain name
  • The new domain name
  • The last four characters of your cPanel password or the last four digits of your credit card that is on the record. You can choose either one of these two options and anyone will work just fine.

You will also need to state if you already own the new primary domain.

Agree that you have read and understood the understand the account rename information including the fact that your username will not change, you cannot rename the account back to the same domain name that you just changed, you have backed up all your files and databases just in case there is any mishap or data loss during the rename process.

After all the information has been included, your domain name change process would be in the works and you have to remember that the process and its timing differs with each bluehost account.