Move to a new server
Migrating your mastodon account from one server to another
When most people start using mastodon, they’ll join one of the larger public servers like mastodon.social
. Over time, though, you may want to start a server for yourself or move to a more specialized server. Here we talk through the best way to move your account.
Mastodon’s migration process
Mastodon does have a built-in process to migrate between servers, which does a lot of the work but has some limitations. Here’s a rough overview of what it does currently:
- automatically moves your followers (you don’t need to tell them you’re changing servers, and they don’t need to take any actions)
- sets a redirection message on your old server profile pointing to the new one
- let you copy the list of people that you follow
- preserves your bookmarks, mute, and block lists
Create the new account
The first step is to create the new account on your chosen server. If you’re stuck finding a new home, fedi.garden and joinmastodon.org/servers are great resources; we can also create and manage a mastodon server for you!
You’ll need to use the Preferences
page on the server you’re moving to, so make sure you’re using it from the web instead of an app.
- once on the
Preferences
page, click on theAccount
tab - scroll to
Moving from a different account
and click thecreate an account alias
link - enter the username of your existing account to transfer and click
Create alias
Export from the old account
While your new server sets up the alias, go to the Preferences
page on your old server and use it to export some other data.
CSV exports
- once on the
Preferences
page, click on theImport and export
tab - click each of the
CSV
links listed in the table to download files (you can skip any files where the total is zero)
Follower export
- once on the
Preferences
page, click on theAccount
tab - scroll to
Move to a different account
and clickConfigure it here
- enter the username and password for the new server here.
Import old account data
Now that your old and new server are syncing your followers, you can import those CSV files that you downloaded from your old server into your new server.
- again in the new server’s
Preferences
page, click on theImport and export
tab - go through and import any CSV files you downloaded in the
CSV exports
step above - be sure to choose the import type from the list; it’s probably best to useMerge
instead ofOverwrite
.
What next
Have a look at your new account to see how things look - you’ll also see that your old profile is now grayed out and showing the redirection.
Your old and new server will each have some work to do as part of the move, so it’s best not to delete the old account, for a little while at least. The process of moving across your followers might also take some time, so it’s best to be patient.