How to Synchronize Databases Across Multiple WordPress/WordPress Installations

Previously, we looked at how to set up a staging environment for WordPress development. If you have followed it through, you may have noticed that the process sometimes involves SQL database migration to synchronize phase differences. This particular database migration process can be tedious.

You will have to export the database from the first site and then import it from one site to another, which can take a few minutes or more for a huge database. This process will need to be repeated every times we migrate the database.

If this is something that you have struggled with, you will certainly find this article helpful. In this article we will see how to streamline database synchronization across multiple WordPress installations. This will save us a lot of time.

Begin

To start, I assume you’ve got three stages of development – Local, Check and Live – all settings.

Here, I have set up a scenario where I have 5 posts published on a live site and another 2 on a local site (one is still under development). In fact though you will be dealing with a lot of posts, rather than just 2 or 5.

Now I want to update local website with above content Live webpage. There is a database content identical to that found on Live, while developing, is recommended. This is so we can catch any problem related to style, layout or anything that might affect early content.

Database Synchronization

To synchronize the database, follow these steps:

1. Install the WordPress plugin, Sync Database. Just install the plugin in the sites where you will be performing database migrations, say if you want to pull the database from a Live entry stage Check phase, then you should install the plugin in the site for these two stages.

2. inside Live website, go to Tools > Database Synchronization. Then generate a secret token key.

   

   You must not share this secret key with anyone as it will also allow them to access your database.

3. Add token in Tools > Database Synchronization of the Local stage website.

   

   Once the token is added you will find Synchronize next to the linked website, as shown in the screenshot above.

4. Click the Sync button to start synchronizing these two sites.

5. Click Drag button to pull down remote site database and replace local webpage.

   

Keep in mind that although the process drag and push It may take a few minutes or longer, depending on the size of the database. Once drag The process is complete, you will see a success message on the screen. And local the site should now have the exact same posts, pages and settings as Live webpage.

Or, click the push button if you want to copy the current site to remote sites. Install this plugin in as many sites as needed and add tokens to bind to their database.

This plugin makes database synchronization seamless and sound. I hope that the plugin developer will improve it further with some extra features such as:

• Sync selector table, which basically allows synchronization for specific tables in the database. For example, since we only need to copy the post content, it would be better to Drag the wp_posts rather than the entire database. This will speed up the process for most cases.
• Media syncfor synchronizing WordPress media uploads like for images and videos.