Watch it first

51 seconds, with narration. The steps below say the same thing in writing.

Before you start: download the zip from the link in our email and keep a copy. Have your hosting login ready. Allow about fifteen minutes.

Where is cPanel at my host?

GoDaddy	account.godaddy.com/products → Web Hosting → Manage → cPanel Admin (or the three-dot menu → File Manager).
Bluehost	Bluehost Portal → Hosting → My Plans → File Manager (or Websites → Manage Site → Files and Access).
HostGator	Customer Portal → Hosting → cPanel under Quick Links.
Namecheap	Hosting List → GO TO CPANEL next to your domain.
InMotion	AMP (Account Management Panel) → cPanel under your account.
hosting.com (A2)	my.hosting.com → Products & Services → Hosting & Servers → Login to Control Panel.

STEP 1

Open the File Manager

Open your host's cPanel (the table below shows where), then in the Files section select File Manager.
Select Settings (top right). Choose Web Root (public_html or www), tick Show Hidden Files (dotfiles), and select Save.
Open public_html in the folder tree on the left.

Your site is on an extra (addon) domain? cPanel → Domains lists each domain's Document Root: use that folder instead of public_html.

cPanel Home → Files → File Manager. Enlarge

Settings: Show Hidden Files, then Save. Enlarge

STEP 2

Move the old site into a backup folder

Select + Folder, name it old-site, Create New Folder.
Select Select All, then hold Ctrl (Cmd on a Mac) and click old-site, .well-known and cgi-bin to leave them out.
Select Move, type /public_html/old-site and select Move File(s).

Why this matters: on most cPanel servers an index.php left behind wins over your new index.html, and an old WordPress .htaccess sends visitors to the old site.

Everything except .well-known, cgi-bin and old-site goes into old-site. Enlarge

STEP 3

Upload the zip

In public_html, select Upload.
Drag the zip in, or Select File and pick it. Wait for 100 %.
Select Go Back to "/home/…/public_html".

Upload page: Select File, wait for 100 %, Go Back. Enlarge

STEP 4

Extract it

Click the zip once to select it, then Extract.
Check the folder says /public_html and select Extract File(s). Close the results box.
Select the zip again and Delete it: it's no longer needed.

Check: index.html must be directly inside public_html, next to the css and images folders.

Select the zip (1), Extract, Extract File(s) (2). Enlarge

Done: index.html in public_html (1), zip deleted (2). Enlarge

Check it works

Open your domain in a private window (or press Ctrl+F5) so you don't see a saved copy of the old site.
Click through every page, and send yourself a test message from the contact form: it goes to the email you gave us.
Padlock missing? cPanel → Security → SSL/TLS Status shows whether your domain has a certificate (most hosts add one automatically within a few hours). Then turn on Force HTTPS Redirect under Domains.
Old site still showing after a few minutes? Clear the host's cache. LiteSpeed hosts: cPanel → Advanced → LiteSpeed Web Cache Manager → Flush All.
Everything works? You can delete old-site later, once you're sure. And update your website on Google: Google Business Profile guide.

Stuck?

Read common problems first: most fixes take a minute.
Your host's own support team can do the upload for you in a few minutes: send them the zip and say "please put these files in my website's web root".
We don't log into hosting accounts, so we can't do the upload for you. If you'd rather not deal with it at all, reply to our email: we can host the site for you on a small monthly plan instead. hello@moxywebstudio.com