What you’ll need
- Your website files on your computer
- DirectAdmin access
Uploading one zip file and extracting it on the server is far quicker and more reliable than uploading hundreds of files. You don’t need to wait for your domain to connect to do this.
Steps
Step 1: Check your home page file
Your site’s front page must be called
index.htmlorindex.php, all lowercase. Rename it if needed.Step 2: Zip the contents, not the folder
Open your site folder, select everything inside it (
index.html,css,images...), and compress those items into a zip. This makes the files land directly inpublic_html.Step 3: Open public_html
Open System Info & Files then File Manager and go to
domains/yourdomain.co.uk/public_html. Where to upload your website: public_html explainedStep 4: Remove the placeholder
If there’s a placeholder
index.htmlyou didn’t create, delete it so it can’t hide your site. Seeing a default page instead of your websiteStep 5: Upload the zip
Select Upload, add your zip, and wait for it to finish.
Step 6: Extract it
Select the zip, choose Extract, keep the destination as
public_html, and extract. Checkindex.htmlnow sits directly insidepublic_html.Step 7: Delete the zip
Remove the zip file from the server. It uses disk space and could be downloaded by anyone guessing its name.
Step 8: Test every page
Once your domain resolves, visit the site in a private window and click through each page, checking images and styles load.
Check it worked
https://yourdomain.co.uk shows your home page, and links, images and stylesheets all load without 404 errors in the browser console.
If something goes wrong
| What happens | What to do |
|---|---|
| Site appears at yourdomain.co.uk/foldername | You zipped the folder. Move its contents up into public_html. |
| Some images or pages 404 | Linux is case-sensitive; check file name capitals match your links. 404 Not Found: why pages are missing and how to fix it |
| Unstyled page | CSS paths are wrong. Use paths starting with /, such as /css/style.css. |
| 403 Forbidden on the home page | No index file in public_html. 403 Forbidden: how to fix it |
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