It will import the images and other media, so long as you select the option to import *everything*. This is really only suitable for populating a new site from fresh.
Surely this is an error/issue as it provides you the option to “import attachments” it does not import any of the attachments.
This means that you have to export everything and then import it all, selecting to import attachments, then manually delete items you do not need.
Why else would the plugin provide an option to import attached files and then it does not import them?
This plugin really is a mess, even with a full import, many items seem to fail.
I just exported everything and then imported everything. All it imported was images, no posts, no pages, nothing.
The only way I can get this to work is to export and import everything so that it imports images. Then I need to export and import posts, pages etc separately so that it imports the content. Then I need to manually edit the db so that the address for all attached content is correctly referenced. Yet WordPress claim that the plugin works with v3.6! Come on WordPress, this is a vital plugin and needs to be addressed.
I have never seen it import images… even with *everything* ticked
I’ve used the WordPress importer off & on successfully for years, it used to import the images associated with a post directly into your Media Library and reference them correctly.
I needed to use the importer again this week and find that the images do NOT get imported. Instead the posts/pages have links to the images residing in the Media Library of the site that I exported from.
Something got broken somewhere, it doesn’t work the way it used to.
OK, I looked through more forum postings, including this one, that gave me a clue: http://wordpress.org/support/topic/import-feature-does-not-import-file-attachments
The clue is if you export everything, then when you use the importer the media is actually imported. (That’s the way I’ve always done it.)
This last week, I exported only the posts (not the pages). When I went to import the XML file, none of the attachments got imported. I just now went back, re-exported (with the “everything” radio button selected) and then was able to import successfully.
(Of course, then I had to go delete the pages that I didn’t want imported.) Sucks, but that’s how “workarounds” work.
That’s my experience with WP 3.5.1 – if you export and import EVERYTHING then all media is physically moved across. If you opt for anything less than everything, then the media does not get imported, but links to that media does.
Like I said in an earlier post, this is what we seem to be stuck with. Use it to migrate or copy a site right at the start, then remove what you don’t want.
However, do keep an eye on this. because it may just be a transient problem, to be fixed later.
I have more than 11 000 posts on my website. When I export it all, the file is to big for a one-time import due to server upload limits. This is quite frustrating.
I would like to see this fixed as I also have never seen the Images get moved over. I moved my first website over in 2010 and it didn’t work. I had to manually move over media, then re-associate the files. That was a long arduous task.
+1
I used a version of the WordPress Importer that another user had tweaked (discussion here: http://wordpress.org/support/topic/plugin-wordpress-importer-not-importing-media-library)
I didn’t go through the code to find the differences, but perhaps the original plugin’s authors could implement the changes.
I have not used this plugin so I can not verify if it works to bring attachments over along with their correct source URLs but maybe a few of you could give it a try and report back here.
http://wordpress.org/plugins/attachment-files-importer/
Landed here with the same woes on 3.6.
Consistent with @imagined I was able to get media imported by “Exporting All” rather than just Posts. Unfortunately the Import process is also somewhat dim in that it does not ask to apply any filters on import forcing an all or nothing requirement to get media transferred.
Tangentially- I also discovered the image links still referred back to the old site/url. Understandably images may link to any site and thus likely one wants to maintain those links during export/import… but considering 99.9% of image links will be internal it would nice if those were adjusted during the import too.
If you haven’t yet, check out the Media Tools plugin.
After importing the posts to your new blog, use this plugin to download images associated with posts to the new WordPress uploads directory, import it into the Media Library, attach it to the correct post and optionally set it as the featured image.
Beware though that if you have alot of posts, this could use as much as all the processing power from your server, denying visitors access to the site. The plugin can be disabled afterwards.
Media Tools did not change the URL of the images for me. It did import the images into my Media directory but the posts still display the images as being linked to the old site.
There has to be a better import/export plugin available for wordpress!
Anybody know of one? I would pay for a working plugin that exported all of my posts with post and featured images and then imported them all into the new site properly.
Also if this can be done by copying over the “uploads” directory and using a search/replace plugin I would do that as well. Anybody know of any way to do this?
Same problem here … did anyone find the solution ?
@nims-
I’ve found success through exporting “all” (as wordpress xml file). When importing, and after choosing your import file to upload, the next screen will have a checkbox to enable importing of page/post media.
This worked for me.
However, when I tried only exporting/importing just Posts or any other subset of “all” this functionality did not work.
