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Importing Media to WordPress with the Importer

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WordPress offers many useful tools and features to help you make the most of your site. One of the key features of WordPress is its ability to manage media, which allows you to easily upload and manage images, videos, and other types of media on your website.

If you have media files that you want to import into WordPress, the WordPress Importer tool can be a great help. In this post, we’ll explore how to use the WordPress Importer to import media files into your WordPress site.

Importing media to WordPress with the Importer

What is the WordPress Importer?

The WordPress Importer is a built-in tool that comes with WordPress, allowing you to import content from other WordPress sites. It is a free tool and is accessible to any WordPress user.

The Importer can import posts, pages, comments, and other types of content, and it can also import media files such as images and videos.

When you import media using the WordPress Importer, the plugin will download the media files from the original site and then re-upload them to the new site. Let’s see how we import media to WordPress using the Importer tool.

Export Media from Your Old Site

Before you can import media to WordPress, you need to export it from your old website. To do this,

1. Navigate to Tools >>Export.

Visit export in tools menu of wordpress

2. In the export options, choose ‘Media’.

3. When you select Media, it will ask for Start Date and End Date. If you want to export the media files created on a particular period you can select it.

Choose media option from export page in WordPress

4. Now click “Download Export File”. This will create an XML file containing all of your media files.

You can use the exported file to import it to your other WordPress site using the WordPress Importer.

Install and Activate the WordPress Importer Plugin

1. To use WordPress Importer, you first need to install and activate the plugin. For that, move to Plugins >> Add New on your WordPress admin dashboard.

2. Search for “WordPress Importer” and click “Install Now.” Once the plugin is installed, click “Activate” to activate it.

Search for WordPress Importer in plugins page on WordPress

Import the Media files using WordPress Importer

Now that you have the WordPress Importer plugin installed and activated, you can begin importing media to your site.

1. Navigate to Tools >> Import.

2. On the Import page, select WordPress from the list of importers. Click on the “Install Now” button if you haven’t installed the WordPress Importer yet. Otherwise, click “Run Importer”.

Run Importer in WordPress

3. Next, you’ll be prompted to upload the XML file containing your media files. Select the XML file that contains the data you want to import. This file should be downloaded from the WordPress website where the media gallery was previously hosted. Click ‘Upload file and import’.

Upload import file in WordPress Importer

4. You can reassign the import author here. Either by typing a new author’s name or choosing an existing author.

5. Check the box that says “Download and import file attachments” to import the media files associated with your posts and pages.

6. Click on the “Submit” button. WordPress will start the media import to your site.

Assign authors and import attachments in Import WordPress page

Check Your Imported Media

Once the import process is complete, you should check your site to make sure that all of your media files were imported successfully. To verify that, go to the “Media” section of your WordPress dashboard to view all of your imported media files. 

If any files were not imported, you may need to troubleshoot the issue or manually upload the missing files.

Limitations of using WordPress Importer for importing Media

Even though WordPress Importer is a useful tool for importing content and media from one website to another, there are some limitations to importing media using the plugin. 

1. File Size: WordPress Importer can handle only limited file sizes. If the file size is big then go for some third-party addon or manually upload them

2. File Type: It allows only importing certain media files like Images, audio, and video files. If you require any other file to be imported choose the third-party addon based on your need.

3. Broken links: Media files containing links to external sources may be broken when you import the files to your new website. For this case, you need to update the links manually after the import is complete.

4. Image sizes: When you import images using the WordPress Importer, the images may be resized to fit the dimensions of your new website. This can result in images that are pixelated or stretched. You may need to resize your images before importing them to avoid this issue. Depending on your requirements, you might want to modify the image’s size, such as making it smaller, larger, or medium, or even editing the height and width, which WordPress importer cannot do.

5. The WordPress Importer may not import all of the metadata associated with your images, such as the title, alt text, and description. You may need to add this information manually after the import is complete or search for a third-party tool to do this.

WP Ultimate CSV Importer is an excellent tool to import a vast amount of media files. You can upload in different file formats, set up image sizes(previously before import), and import images along with their metadata(title, description, caption, alt texts). You can update/replace broken images with new images just by editing links in your file and simply re-importing them.

Conclusion

Using the WordPress Importer to import media files can save more time and effort, especially if you have a lot of files to import. With just a few simple steps, you can easily import your media files into your WordPress site and start using them in your posts and pages.

But remember that, the WordPress Importer is just one of many tools available in WordPress to help you manage your site. If you have any questions about using the Importer or any other WordPress feature, don’t hesitate to reach out to the WordPress community for help.

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