Importing Eleventy content into WordPress

Related to redoing this blog, I thought I’d quickly share how I exported all of my 11ty content and imported it into WordPress.

Steps

First up, I installed a fresh copy of WordPress and cleaned out the default posts, pages and comments.

Then, in the existing Eleventy project, I added the following page—which I named wp.njk—which generates an XML file, which the WordPress importer can understand:

---
permalink: 'wp.xml'
---
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>

<rss version="2.0"
xmlns:excerpt="http://wordpress.org/export/1.2/excerpt/"
xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/"
xmlns:wfw="http://wellformedweb.org/CommentAPI/"
xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/"
xmlns:wp="http://wordpress.org/export/1.2/"
>

<channel>
  <title>YOUR NAME HERE</title>
  <link>YOUR WEB ADDRESS</link>
  <description>Just another WordPress site</description>
  <pubDate>Wed, 15 Dec 2021 10:27:40 +0000</pubDate>
  <language>en-GB</language>
  <wp:wxr_version>1.2</wp:wxr_version>
  <wp:base_site_url>YOUR WEB ADDRESS</wp:base_site_url>
  <wp:base_blog_url>YOUR WEB ADDRESS</wp:base_blog_url>
  <wp:category>
    <wp:term_id>1</wp:term_id>
    <wp:category_nicename><![CDATA[uncategorized]]></wp:category_nicename>
    <wp:category_parent><![CDATA[]]></wp:category_parent>
    <wp:cat_name><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></wp:cat_name>
  </wp:category>
  <wp:term>
    <wp:term_id>1</wp:term_id>
    <wp:term_taxonomy><![CDATA[category]]></wp:term_taxonomy>
    <wp:term_slug><![CDATA[uncategorized]]></wp:term_slug>
    <wp:term_parent><![CDATA[]]></wp:term_parent>
    <wp:term_name><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></wp:term_name>
  </wp:term>
  <generator>https://wordpress.org/?v=5.8.1</generator>
  {% for item in collections.items %}
  <item>
    <title><![CDATA[{{ item.date }}]]></title>
    <link>YOUR WEB ADDRESS/{{ item.fileSlug }}/</link>
    <pubDate>{{ item.data.title }}</pubDate>
    <dc:creator><![CDATA[test]]></dc:creator>
    <description></description>
    <content:encoded><![CDATA[{{ item.templateContent | safe }}]]></content:encoded>
    <excerpt:encoded><![CDATA[]]></excerpt:encoded>
    <wp:post_id>{{ loop.index + 5 }}</wp:post_id>
    <wp:post_date><![CDATA[{{ item.data.title | w3DateFilter }}]]></wp:post_date>
    <wp:comment_status><![CDATA[closed]]></wp:comment_status>
    <wp:ping_status><![CDATA[closed]]></wp:ping_status>
    <wp:post_name><![CDATA[{{ item.fileSlug }}d]]></wp:post_name>
    <wp:status><![CDATA[publish]]></wp:status>
    <wp:post_parent>0</wp:post_parent>
    <wp:menu_order>0</wp:menu_order>
    <wp:post_type><![CDATA[post]]></wp:post_type>
    <wp:post_password><![CDATA[]]></wp:post_password>
    <wp:is_sticky>0</wp:is_sticky>
    <category domain="category" nicename="uncategorized"><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
  </item>
  {% endfor %}
  </channel>
</rss>

The {% for item in collections.items %} part refers to the Eleventy collection—which in my case was items. I then loop through those to create a WordPress post. Make sure you replace YOUR WEB ADDRESS with your actual website.

Then, import it into WordPress and bish, bash, bosh: you’re all done.