GoDaddy to Hostinger: Three Migrations, Not One
This migration stalls halfway more often than almost any other, and the reason is structural: it’s three independent migrations that people attempt as one.
- The hosting — files and database
- The email — mailboxes and MX records
- The domain — the registrar transfer
They have different mechanics, different waiting periods and different failure modes. Done in the wrong order they interfere with each other; done in the right order none of them touches the others.
What it saves
The reason for the move, over three years on comparable shared plans:
| Year 1 | Year 2 | Year 3 | Total | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| GoDaddy Economy | $71.88 | $71.88 | $71.88 | $215.64 |
| Hostinger Premium | $35.88 | $35.88 | $35.88 | $107.64 |
About $108 over three years on hosting alone, before the add-ons GoDaddy prices separately and Hostinger bundles — SSL, CDN, domain privacy, migrations and first-year mailboxes.
Worth knowing before you start: GoDaddy’s renewal multiple is 2.0×, which is gentler than most of the market. If your complaint is specifically the renewal cliff, it’s milder than the internet suggests. The saving here comes from the base rate and the bundling, not from escaping an unusual increase.
The Microsoft 365 trap
Read this section before you touch anything, because one of the mistakes it describes is unrecoverable.
If your email is Microsoft 365 bought through GoDaddy, GoDaddy is acting as a reseller of a Microsoft tenant. That arrangement has consequences most people discover mid-move:
Your licences don’t transfer. M365 plans bought through GoDaddy won’t move to Microsoft — they’re subject to GoDaddy’s refund policy, and you buy new licences from Microsoft or another reseller afterwards.
Moving your email doesn’t release the domain from the tenant. The domain stays associated with the Microsoft tenant even after you’ve moved mail.
GoDaddy can’t remove itself as the reseller until all your GoDaddy subscriptions have expired.
There is no direct tenant migration. The documented path is manual: remove the domain from the M365 tenant on the GoDaddy side, cancel the subscription, buy a new subscription from Microsoft or another reseller, then add the domain to that one.
And the one that does permanent damage:
Do not buy new mailboxes from Microsoft or another reseller before the move is finished. Buying early creates a new tenant that cannot be merged with your existing one.
Also: don’t delete your GoDaddy mailboxes before the move. Once they’re gone, so is the mail in them.
If this applies to you, treat email as its own project with its own timeline — probably weeks rather than an afternoon — and don’t begin it in the same week as the hosting move.
The order that works
Stage 1 — hosting, without touching email
Hostinger offers free migration, and its policy is unlimited transfers, so this stage is largely someone else’s job.
The rule that keeps this stage safe: change the A record, leave the MX records exactly as they are. Your website moves to Hostinger; your mail continues arriving at GoDaddy untouched. The two are independent records and there is no reason to move them together.
- Sign up for Hostinger and request the migration
- Lower your DNS TTL to 300 seconds, 48 hours ahead
- Preview the migrated site via your local hosts file before any DNS change — browse the real domain against the new IP and test forms, checkout and admin
- Issue SSL on the new server using a DNS-01 challenge if available, so the certificate is valid before the switch rather than after — the mechanics are here
- Update the A record only
- Verify the site, then verify email still arrives
Wait a week. There is no prize for compressing this.
Stage 2 — email
Now, and only now, deal with mail.
If it’s GoDaddy-resold Microsoft 365, follow the sequence in the section above: remove the domain from the tenant, cancel, repurchase elsewhere, re-add. Don’t buy anything early.
If it’s ordinary GoDaddy email, it’s much simpler: export the mail, create the mailboxes at the destination, import, then change MX records.
Two destinations worth considering:
Zoho Mail has a free tier covering up to 5 users with 5 GB each on one custom domain — enough for many small businesses at no cost. The limitation to know: the free plan excludes IMAP, POP and ActiveSync, so it’s webmail and mobile app only. If you need Outlook or Apple Mail, you’re on a paid tier.
Hostinger’s own mailboxes are included free for the first year on its shared plans, which keeps everything in one account.
Whichever you choose: create the mailboxes, migrate the mail, change MX records last, and send a test in both directions before cancelling anything.
Stage 3 — the domain, last
Transfer the registrar only once the site and email are stable somewhere else. If it goes slowly, nothing is broken while you wait.
The 60-day lock is the thing to plan around. A domain cannot be transferred within 60 days of initial registration, within 60 days of a previous transfer, or within 60 days of a change to the registrant contact details. That last one catches people — updating your email address on the domain because you’ve just changed email providers starts a two-month clock.
So: transfer first, update registrant details afterwards. Not the other way round.
The mechanics:
- Unlock the domain at GoDaddy and disable privacy if the transfer requires it
- Request the EPP / authorisation code — GoDaddy emails it to the registrant address, which is another reason to do this before changing that address
- Start the transfer at the receiving registrar and pay for it
- Approve the confirmation email
- Wait up to five days
The transfer adds a year to your registration at the new registrar’s rate — so doing this near renewal means you’re buying a year you’d have bought anyway, at a promotional price. The full economics are here.
Namecheap is the usual destination and includes WHOIS privacy free rather than charging for it. Hostinger also registers domains if you’d rather consolidate.
Why not do it all at once
Because each stage has a waiting period, and running them concurrently means every failure is ambiguous.
If email stops and you’ve moved hosting, changed MX records and started a domain transfer in the same 48 hours, you have three suspects and no clean rollback. Staged, the answer to “what broke it” is always the thing you did most recently — and the previous stage is still a working fallback.
Total realistic timeline: a week for hosting, one to three weeks for email if Microsoft 365 is involved, five days for the domain. Call it a month, mostly spent waiting.
How we checked this
The Microsoft 365 facts are from GoDaddy’s own help documentation and Microsoft’s published guidance: that M365 plans bought through GoDaddy don’t transfer and are subject to its refund policy; that moving email doesn’t release the domain from the Microsoft tenant; that GoDaddy can’t remove itself as reseller until all subscriptions expire; that there’s no direct tenant migration path; and that buying mailboxes before completing the move creates a new tenant that cannot be merged. That last point is the reason this section leads the article.
The domain transfer rules — a 60-day lock after registration, after a previous transfer and after a registrant contact change, and a transfer adding one year to the term — are ICANN Transfer Policy provisions as documented consistently across registrars, covered in our domain renewal analysis.
Hostinger’s Premium pricing at $2.99/mo on a 48-month term renewing at $10.99, its unlimited free migrations, and its bundled SSL, CDN, domain privacy and first-year mailboxes are its published terms. Zoho Mail’s free tier — five users, 5 GB each, one custom domain, no IMAP/POP/ActiveSync — is its published limit.
GoDaddy’s pricing is secondary-sourced. Its site returned a 403 to every automated request we made, and when a browser did load it, it served the German site in euros. The $5.99 promotional and $11.99 renewal figures are the most commonly cited, but reported renewal rates vary between $9.99 and $11.99 — check your own account rather than our table.
What we did not do: we have not performed this migration, and in particular we have not moved a GoDaddy-resold Microsoft 365 tenant. That section is a summary of the vendors’ own documented procedure, and given that one misstep in it is unrecoverable, read GoDaddy’s and Microsoft’s own articles before you begin rather than relying on this summary. The staging and timelines are our recommendation, not measured durations.
The Hostinger, Namecheap and Zoho links above are affiliate links, as is GoDaddy.
FAQ
How do I move from GoDaddy to Hostinger?
As three separate migrations in order: hosting first (change the A record, leave MX alone), then email once the site is stable, then the domain transfer last. Allow about a month, mostly waiting.
Will my email break if I move hosting to Hostinger?
Not if you only change the A record. MX records are separate and control mail routing — leave them pointing at GoDaddy until you deliberately move email as its own project.
What happens to Microsoft 365 bought through GoDaddy?
The licences don’t transfer. You remove the domain from the tenant, cancel the GoDaddy subscription and buy new licences from Microsoft or another reseller. Critically, don’t buy the new mailboxes early — that creates a second tenant that can’t be merged.
Does Hostinger migrate my site for free?
Yes — it offers unlimited free migrations, which is the most generous policy among the hosts we’ve compared.
How long does a domain transfer from GoDaddy take?
Up to five days once approved, plus you need the EPP code and an unlocked domain. Watch the 60-day lock, which applies after registration, after a previous transfer, and after changing registrant contact details.
Should I update my domain contact details before transferring?
No — do it after. Changing registrant details starts a 60-day transfer lock, which is the most common self-inflicted delay in this whole process.
How much will I save moving to Hostinger?
About $108 over three years on hosting alone, plus the add-ons GoDaddy prices separately and Hostinger includes — SSL, CDN, domain privacy, migrations and first-year mailboxes.
