krisz
Kelsey HightowerI chose mastodon.social because it felt like the default at the time. How easy is it to move between servers? Do I basically have to start over?
David L. Herring@kelseyhightower I saw that @matthewp tried switching, and at first just mentioned that he had to redo all of his following, but he ultimately switched back due to other complications and quirks.
Matthew Phillips@davidlherring @kelseyhightower You lose your following but not followers.
Other thing to note is that different servers have different character limits. I went from one with a 5000 limit to 500!
But if you do proper planning and know what you're switching to it's pretty seemless.
o ifrit caduco 🦔🫚⛈️🐌🌰🍛@matthewp @davidlherring @kelseyhightower You can just import your followees 👌 Nobody is left behind 😉
Tierney Cyren@kelseyhightower in settings there’s migration UI. Should be pretty straightforward from there but I’ve not done it so can’t speak to it - I’d not be shocked if it was… annoying, despite working.
Jeff Caldwell@kelseyhightower It's not hard at all: https://mastodon.social/@Gargron/103393780267601137
benjamin black@kelseyhightower export data from your current server, import follows on new account, initiate transfer on new account, initiate transfer on old account.
Roberto Selbach 
@kelseyhightower go to your settings -> Account, scroll down to Move to a different server and follow the instructions. It will move your followers and followings. It won't move your posts though.
Moke 
@kelseyhightower you can use the built-in system to migrate to another server
Marcin Grzejszczak@kelseyhightower I moved 3 times already. You can read more about how to do it here https://docs.joinmastodon.org/user/moving/
kat@kelseyhightower your posts stay behind but you keep all your followers. Your old account stays up as a tombstone/redirect. And you can also do export/import of your posts separately. But the move itself is super easy
Elise Huard@kelseyhightower easy, I did it last week. You do lose your posts, but keep follows and followers (and blocks if you have any). I found good guides online.
robbie@kelseyhightower i feel you on this, I just can't work out where to go *to*
mastodon.social seems to be suffering in terms of moderation from the influx of users and new content against a mod team of.... one? i've not been directly affected, but clearly it's causing some big issues for others.
Jeff@kelseyhightower It's pretty straightforward. You will loose your posts but not your followers or who you follow. Check out Eugen's post on how to move instances.
jpyz@kelseyhightower the part that wasn't clear to me about moving was that it takes a while for things to propagate - iirc you set your old account to alias to your new one, but it takes 24 hours until you're able to do the import from the new one to (start to) pull your followers. But ultimately it all works and is fine
AndiMann@kelseyhightower Why are you looking to move? i started over there, but am now on another server run by the same people. Didn't migrate my old account, just started a new one, but apparently it's not so hard to novate. I might go back, but not sure whyi would?
Stephen Nimmo 
Luc van Donkersgoed@kelseyhightower switched from mastodon.social to hachyderm.io today. Lost no followers / following, did (on purpose) lose my post history, and gained a looot better performance on this instance.
Adam Hall 
🇳🇿 🇺🇸@kelseyhightower the real question is whether you’ll stand up your own little instance for a vanity domain handle :)
It’s fun to do even if you dont migrate to see how it hangs together, I built one up on a spare old laptop and also on spacebear hosting just to play!
@Adman Oh, you know that's the next thing on the list.
John Minnihan@kelseyhightower it's a slightly weird process.
1. create + get approved a new account
2. create an alias in the new account back to the old one
3. move account in the original to the new
i did this today + made multiple mistakes but i finally got it right. it worked well.
David Michael 
@kelseyhightower instructions are below in official docs. I haven’t done it but docs explain the details of it. Not a complete start over.
Goldfish@kelseyhightower others already explained how to do is. I just want to add that I wouldn’t consider it easy for non IT people, but doable. It is a thing which should be improved in the future, though. Live migrations with a 3-way-handshake or something like that would be awesome. Another thought: I am waiting for twitter.com to provide my download with my data in order to finally deactivate my account there since more than 12 hours and counting. That’s a challenge of patience.
Daphne@kelseyhightower After you create the new account, it's a few clicks and enter your old password to confirm. It transfers your followers, follows, blocks and mutes.
Your old toots will stay in place. People tend to say you "lose" them but I'd say that's misleading.. They're still there, and if people click on your account link from them they will see a notice that you've moved and can link to your new account.
Andreas@kelseyhightower be aware that if you change servers followers can appear “lost” at first.
There’s a delay in Follower migrations, e.g. a remote instance is busy and lagging? Those followers will appear “lost” and only come back later, once the other instance had a chance to process the change.
If an instance of a follower is dead/gone, they are lost for good.
Nothing critical but just something to keep in mind I’m order to not be surprised. Expectation management.
@ixs Thanks for the heads up.
Scott Hanselman ✅👸🏽🐝🌮@kelseyhightower @thomasfuchs just moved yesterday and I, as a follower, didn’t have to do anything.
Jo Shields@shanselman @kelseyhightower @thomasfuchs moving is automatic for your follow_ERS_
For follows, lists, mutes, blocks, and bookmarks, you can export as CSV from the old instance and import to the new one.
There's no migration of posts themselves.
andr3 
@kelseyhightower ensure you are moving to an instance running a similar version of mastodon. If they're too far apart, it can cause issues.
https://toot.andr3.net/@me/109299786274432328 (v3.5.3 => v3.1.3)
You essentially set up an alias in the new account, aimed at the old one. Then trigger the move in the old one.
Timelines/toots and ppl you follow do not migrate. Followers do.
Just export the list of accounts you follow in the old one (CSV) and import in the new one. Done.
andr3 (@[email protected])
Attached: 1 image In case you're wondering, I have a redirect from andr3.net => toot.andr3.net where my instance actually lives. This seemed to have tripped the process of Moving accounts. The old account didn't detect that the new account had an alias correctly setup. So I started over with 0 followers. Worth it. :)
Sean@kelseyhightower from what I gather the process isn't hard and your followers have a seamless experience. However I don't think your toots come with you!
India Amos@kelseyhightower What everybody else said, but also: favourites are not exportable when you move; bookmarks are. So if you've been faving posts and want to access them after the move, bookmark them.
Steren@kelseyhightower I switched between a Mastodon instance to a solo instance. You can setup redirects and your followers will stay with you. So you can move anytime!
ZahmbieND@kelseyhightower
If you go to "Data Export" in settings and download all the CSV files on that screen, then import them on the "Import" screen in the new account, it will copy all your follows, blocks, etc. to the new instance.
Then you can use the "transfer from instance" and "transfer to instance" options in settings to redirect all of your followers to the new account.
Pretty much everything except your old posts will transfer over to the new account.
If you go to "Data Export" in settings and download all the CSV files on that screen, then import them on the "Import" screen in the new account, it will copy all your follows, blocks, etc. to the new instance.
Then you can use the "transfer from instance" and "transfer to instance" options in settings to redirect all of your followers to the new account.
Pretty much everything except your old posts will transfer over to the new account.
@kelseyhightower
Also any follows who have the option enabled to manually approve followers will have to approve your follow again, because the follow request is coming from a new account.
Also any follows who have the option enabled to manually approve followers will have to approve your follow again, because the follow request is coming from a new account.
@kelseyhightower
The "Import" page is the same way the tools like Debirdify work to bulk follow people who you followed on the bird site, generating a CSV file of accounts that you can import.
The "Import" page is the same way the tools like Debirdify work to bulk follow people who you followed on the bird site, generating a CSV file of accounts that you can import.
William (Bill) Kennedy 
@kelseyhightower I'm helping to moderate techhub.social. Friends have been running and moderating the instance incredibly well. The moderation features are really well done.
xntrik@kelseyhightower I believe you lose your "joined date"..
A. Sebastian Dietzel 😎🥳@kelseyhightower
Its easy, I moved to my own pi4 running mastodon in docker.
Its easy, I moved to my own pi4 running mastodon in docker.