Docs / Getting Started / Import / Migration Guide

Import / Migration Guide

Migrate view counts from WP-PostViews, Post Views Counter, Statify, and others.

Supported Sources

View Counter WP can import data from:

  • WP-PostViews — imports from the views post meta key
  • Post Views Counter — imports totals + daily history
  • Statify — imports all-time aggregate counts and daily history
  • Page Views Count — imports from the plugin’s post meta

How to Import

  1. Go to View Counter → Imports
  2. The diagnostics panel at the top shows which sources are detected
  3. For each source, click Dry Run first to preview without writing data
  4. Review the results, then click Run Import to commit
Note

Always run a Dry Run first. This previews what will be imported without writing any data to your database.

Merge Strategy

Imports use a safe merge approach:

  • If View Counter already has a count for a post, it keeps the larger value
  • It never overwrites a higher existing count with a lower imported count
  • Daily history rows are inserted without duplicating existing dates

After Importing

  1. Verify counts look correct in View Counter → Dashboard
  2. Check a few individual posts in the Views column
  3. Deactivate the old plugin (but don’t delete it yet until you’re confident)
  4. Once satisfied, you can safely delete the old plugin
Warning

Import is a one-way operation. While it doesn’t delete source data, there’s no built-in undo — take a database backup before running large imports.