Wix won't let me export my site. Doesn't that trap me?

It's less of a problem than it sounds. Wix genuinely has no way to export your site, because a Wix site only runs on Wix's own machines. But bernard doesn't need an export. It reads your live pages the way a visitor's browser does, so what you see published is what comes across. You paste your address and look at the result before you decide anything.

What should I save by hand before I cancel?

Three things Wix will not hand over in bulk. Your photos, because there's no one-click download of all your media folders. Your search settings, the page titles and descriptions you wrote, because those can't be exported at all. And anything sold as a digital download, which also can't be exported. A shop product list can be exported, so that one is easier.

What happens to my Wix site while I'm setting the new one up?

Nothing. It stays live and takes visitors exactly as it does now. Your new site sits on a temporary address of its own until you decide to switch, and nothing bernard prepares reaches your real address without your approval. Keep paying Wix until the new site is tested and live.

Not if you leave the email settings alone. Many Wix customers have Google Workspace with Wix handling the billing, which means Google actually runs the mail. Moving the website doesn't require moving that. The records that carry your email are separate from the ones that point at your website, and you only ever add the website ones.

What happens if I just stop paying Wix?

Your site stops being a proper website. Cancelling the paid plan takes your custom address off it and puts the site back on a Wix-branded address with Wix's own advertising on it. So don't cancel until the new site is live, tested, and taking visitors at your real address.

Leave Wix when there's no way to export my site

Almost everyone leaving Wix asks the same question first, and it's usually asked with a note of panic: there's no export button, so how do I get my site out?

The honest answer is that you don't, and you don't need to.

Why there's no export, and why it doesn't matter

Wix sites run only on Wix. The site is built out of Wix's own technology and leans on Wix's own services to work at all, so Wix cannot hand you a copy that runs anywhere else. That's a real limitation and it isn't going to change.

But an export was never how a move works here anyway. Bernard reads your live, published pages, the same way a visitor's browser does, and builds your new site from what's actually on the screen. A site that renders for a visitor renders for bernard.

So the practical position is a good one: you paste your web address, and you get a free show-home of your own site to look at before you commit to anything. The thing Wix won't give you turns out not to be the thing you needed.

What genuinely won't come across

Being straight about this matters more than reassurance. A few things live in your Wix dashboard rather than on your pages, and no amount of reading your site will find them.

Your photos, at original quality. Wix has no one-click download of all your media folders, so if you want the originals rather than the web-sized versions on your pages, save them while you still have access.
Your search settings. The page titles and descriptions you wrote for Google cannot be exported in any form. Bernard reads what's live on each page and writes fresh ones as part of the move, so this is less of a loss than it sounds, but if you have wording you're attached to, copy it out.
Digital downloads. If you sell files, exporting digital products isn't supported. Keep your own copies of the actual files.
Anything from a third-party app you added to the site. Those live with whoever made them.

A shop product list is the easy one: Wix does let you export your products, so a shop coming across has a proper starting point (Move my Shopify shop across).

Your domain and your email

If you bought your address from Wix, it can stay registered there, with Wix still sending the renewal bill, while the website itself runs on bernard. You add a few settings that point visitors at the new site. Moving the domain to another company is optional and best done later, once everything is live.

Many Wix customers have Google Workspace with Wix handling the billing, which means the mail is really Google's and carries on regardless. The rules are the same as anywhere:

Only add the records you are shown.
Don't delete MX records. They carry your email.
Don't delete email-related TXT records.
Don't change your nameservers as part of this ordinary connection. Moving the whole DNS service is a separate job that needs a complete record inventory.

Take screenshots of your existing settings before you touch anything. The full walkthrough is in Connect my own web address (domain) to my site.

The safe order

Paste your address into bernard and look at the show-home. Nothing has changed at Wix, and nothing has been paid.
Save the four things above by hand while you still have a live Wix account. This is the step you cannot go back for.
Check the new site properly. The pages you care about, the wording, the pictures. If you had unpublished pages in Wix, it's worth knowing what happened to them (What happens to my unpublished or draft pages when I move?).
Connect your domain and let the switch happen.
Test everything: both versions of your address, your contact form, sending and receiving email, and any shop or booking pages.
Only then, cancel the Wix plan.

Don't cancel early

This is the one that costs people. Cancelling your paid Wix plan doesn't just stop the bill: it takes your own web address off the site and puts it back on a Wix-branded address carrying Wix's advertising. If you cancel before the new site is live, you get a gap where your business has no proper website at all.

Keep paying Wix until your real address is serving the new site and everything on the test list works. One extra month is cheap insurance.

So the order is: look at the show-home, save what can't be exported, connect the domain, test, then cancel.

The prompt

“I'm moving my website off Wix to bernard. My address is [yourbusiness.com], I bought it [from Wix / somewhere else], and my business email opens in [Gmail / Outlook / somewhere else]. Tell me what will come across from my Wix site, what I should save by hand before I cancel, and the order to do it in.”

Press Copy, then paste it into your AI and fill in the [bracketed] parts. First time? Connect your AI to bernard first - a one-time setup in bernard → your site → Use your own AI.

Questions people ask

Wix won't let me export my site. Doesn't that trap me?: It's less of a problem than it sounds. Wix genuinely has no way to export your site, because a Wix site only runs on Wix's own machines. But bernard doesn't need an export. It reads your live pages the way a visitor's browser does, so what you see published is what comes across. You paste your address and look at the result before you decide anything.
What should I save by hand before I cancel?: Three things Wix will not hand over in bulk. Your photos, because there's no one-click download of all your media folders. Your search settings, the page titles and descriptions you wrote, because those can't be exported at all. And anything sold as a digital download, which also can't be exported. A shop product list can be exported, so that one is easier.
What happens to my Wix site while I'm setting the new one up?: Nothing. It stays live and takes visitors exactly as it does now. Your new site sits on a temporary address of its own until you decide to switch, and nothing bernard prepares reaches your real address without your approval. Keep paying Wix until the new site is tested and live.
Will my email break?: Not if you leave the email settings alone. Many Wix customers have Google Workspace with Wix handling the billing, which means Google actually runs the mail. Moving the website doesn't require moving that. The records that carry your email are separate from the ones that point at your website, and you only ever add the website ones.
What happens if I just stop paying Wix?: Your site stops being a proper website. Cancelling the paid plan takes your custom address off it and puts the site back on a Wix-branded address with Wix's own advertising on it. So don't cancel until the new site is live, tested, and taking visitors at your real address.