Case Study
View Case StudyTray.ai
Migrating hundreds of thousands of pages, re-platforming and extending for the leading composable AI integration platform
From Craft CMS to WordPress
We are the Craft CMS to WordPress migration experts
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Challenges with Craft CMS
Key pain points
The elephant in the room is PHP. Craft requires a traditional LAMP-style hosting setup with PHP 8.2+ and MySQL or Postgres, which immediately rules out the serverless and edge-first hosting that modern JavaScript frameworks thrive on. You're managing servers, configuring OPcache, tuning database connections, and dealing with all the operational overhead that comes with self-hosted PHP applications. For teams already working in the JavaScript ecosystem, this is a hard sell.
Major version upgrades are genuinely painful. Craft doesn't support skipping major versions, so migrating from Craft 2 to 5 means stepping through every version in between. Each jump brings breaking changes to Twig templates, PHP requirements, and plugin compatibility. We've seen agencies spend weeks on upgrades that should have been straightforward. The Team tier starts at $279 per project and the Pro tier costs $399, plus $99 annual renewals for both. A free Solo tier exists for single-user projects, but costs still add up for agencies, especially when you factor in plugins and the recent trend toward stricter licence enforcement in the control panel.
The community, while passionate, is relatively small compared to WordPress or even newer headless CMS platforms. When you hit an edge case or need help with a niche plugin, you may find yourself digging through GitHub issues rather than finding a ready answer. And while Craft Cloud exists as a managed hosting option, it's still maturing and doesn't yet match the deployment experience you'd get with platforms like Vercel or Netlify.
PHP hosting requirements
You need a traditional server with PHP 8.2+, MySQL or Postgres, and proper configuration. No serverless, no edge deployment, no modern hosting shortcuts.
Painful major version upgrades
You can't skip major versions, so upgrades mean stepping through each release with breaking Twig, PHP, and plugin changes along the way.
Smaller community and ecosystem
The community is dedicated but small. Finding answers to niche problems often means digging through GitHub issues or waiting on forum responses.
Licence costs add up
The Team tier is $279 per project and Pro is $399, both with $99 annual renewals, plus paid plugins on top. A free Solo tier exists for single-user projects, but costs add up quickly for agencies managing multiple client sites.
Learning curve for non-developers
Craft assumes your team includes developers. Content editors coming from WordPress or simpler tools will need time to adjust to the more structured interface.
Twig templating limitations
Twig is clean but limited compared to modern component frameworks. Complex UI logic gets awkward, and you're locked into whatever Twig version Craft supports.
Benefits of WordPress
Key advantages
We're trying our hardest to think of good reasons to move to WordPress, but outside of "I like PHP errors" or trying to build a website for under £500, I honestly can't think of a good reason. If you're trying to do things on the cheap, we would highly recommend using a template from Framer or Webflow. They're better solutions in almost every way.
But if you're hell-bent on building a WordPress website, we can't stop you. For that reason, we'd highly recommend SiteGround for hosting to keep it cheap and optimize the hell out of it with their performance plugin. Avoid installing tons of plugins if you can; keep it lean and simple.
Plugins for everything
You want a form? A store? A booking system? A horoscope generator for cats? WordPress has a plugin for it. Half the internet runs on “someone already built that.”
Strong community support
If something breaks, someone online has already fixed it, documented it, blogged about it, and made a YouTube tutorial with dramatic background music.
Easy to use
You can be a writer, founder, or intern, you can easily build a website using WordPress. It doesn’t demand a CS degree. Click, type, publish. Done.
Vast theme selection
You might need a corporate website, minimal, or even a neon-purple-cyber-punk ecommerce store; just pick a theme and ship. Some even look good straight out of the box.
Ideal for beginners
One of the easiest ways to get a site live without knowing the difference between HTML and “the thing that makes the text bold.”
Flexible configuration options
Layers of configuration, widgets, design settings, and custom plugins will only let you shape WordPress into something that actually fits your use case.
Common questions
Craft CMS to WordPress migration FAQs
Answers to the most common questions about Craft CMS to WordPress migration
How much does Craft CMS cost for an agency managing multiple sites?
The costs add up quicker than most agencies expect. The Solo tier is free for single-user projects, Team is $279 per project, and Pro is $399 per project. Both paid tiers carry a $99 annual renewal fee. If you're running 10 client sites on Pro, that's $3,990 upfront plus $990 per year in renewals before you've paid for a single plugin. Popular plugins like SEOmatic, Blitz (caching), and Navigation run $99-$199 each. Factor in PHP hosting ($20-$100/month per site depending on traffic) and the total per-project cost lands between $500 and $1,500 in year one. It's reasonable for individual projects but the aggregate cost across a portfolio is where agencies feel the squeeze.
What are the hidden costs of running Craft CMS?
Beyond licensing, three costs catch teams off guard. First, PHP hosting. Craft needs PHP 8.2+, MySQL or Postgres, and proper server configuration. You can't deploy to Vercel or Netlify like you would with a headless CMS. Budget $20-$100/month per site for decent managed hosting. Second, major version upgrades. Craft doesn't let you skip versions, so going from Craft 3 to 5 means stepping through 3 to 4, then 4 to 5, each with breaking changes to Twig templates and plugin compatibility. We've seen agencies spend 20-40 hours per upgrade. Third, developer dependency. Craft assumes your team has PHP developers on hand. If your agency is moving toward JavaScript stacks, maintaining Craft expertise becomes an overhead.
Should I migrate from Craft CMS to a headless CMS?
It depends on your stack direction. If your team is comfortable with PHP and Twig, and your sites are traditional server-rendered builds, Craft still works well. But if you're building with Next.js, React, or any modern JavaScript framework, Craft becomes friction. Its GraphQL API exists but it's a bolt-on, not a native experience. The content modelling in Craft is genuinely good, and that translates well to headless platforms. We've migrated Craft sites to Sanity where the content structures mapped over almost one-to-one. The frontend rebuild in Next.js typically takes 6-10 weeks, and the result is faster, cheaper to host, and easier to iterate on.
What's the biggest challenge when migrating off Craft CMS?
Twig templates. Every piece of frontend logic in a Craft project lives in Twig, and none of it carries over to a modern JavaScript framework. You're essentially rebuilding every template from scratch. Content migration itself is manageable since Craft's data structures are well-organised, and you can export through the Element API or direct database queries. The other challenge is plugin replacement. If you rely on Craft plugins for forms, SEO, or search, you need to find equivalents in your new stack. We build a dependency audit before any Craft migration so there are no surprises mid-project.
What are the best WordPress alternatives?
It depends on what you're building. For marketing sites, Webflow or Framer will get you further with less pain. For content-heavy projects that need a headless CMS, Sanity is our go-to recommendation. It gives developers full control over the frontend while editors get a clean, modern interface. If you're a developer looking for alternatives specifically, Next.js paired with Sanity or even a static site generator will outperform WordPress on speed, security, and developer experience.
How much does WordPress cost per month?
WordPress.org itself is free, but hosting, themes, premium plugins, and maintenance add up quickly. A basic setup on SiteGround runs about $3-15/month for hosting. Add a premium theme ($50-200 one-time), a few paid plugins ($100-500/year), and a security solution. Realistically, you're looking at $30-100/month for a properly maintained small business site. WordPress.com's managed plans run $4/month (Personal) to $45/month (Commerce) on annual billing, and plugin installs only unlock on the Business plan and above at $25/month. WordPress.com Enterprise starts at $25,000/year.
How do I migrate from WordPress to a headless CMS?
We start by exporting your WordPress content using WP's REST API or a database export, then restructure it for the target CMS. Posts, pages, categories, tags, media, and custom fields all get mapped to the new schema. The frontend gets rebuilt in a modern framework like Next.js. The whole process usually takes 3-6 weeks depending on how many custom post types and plugins you have. We've done this migration enough times to have solid tooling for it.
What are the best WordPress alternatives for developers?
If you're a developer tired of PHP and plugin conflicts, look at headless CMS options paired with a frontend framework. Sanity with Next.js is our top pick. You get TypeScript, version control for your content schema, and a frontend you actually enjoy working with. Strapi is another option if you want self-hosted and open-source. For simple sites, Astro with markdown content is surprisingly powerful and deploys anywhere.
Is it worth migrating away from WordPress?
For most teams we work with, yes. The maintenance burden alone costs more than people realize. Between plugin updates, security patches, performance tuning, and the occasional site-breaking PHP error, WordPress demands constant attention. Modern alternatives give you better performance, stronger security by default, and a developer experience that doesn't feel like 2010. The migration itself is an investment, but the reduced ongoing costs and improved site speed usually pay for it within 6-12 months.
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