Agency-managed / subscription
Moving your website off Hibu
Hibu builds and manages websites for local businesses on a monthly subscription. Before you decide whether to stay, it is worth reading two specific paragraphs of the agreement you signed — because they cover who holds your domain and what happens when you cancel.
Where you actually stand
The Hibu arrangement is a managed one: they build the site, they host it, they maintain it, and you pay monthly. For a business owner with no interest in websites that is a reasonable trade, and plenty of people are content with it.
The thing to understand is what you have at the end. Hibu’s Smart Sites Service Terms state at paragraph 8(a) that the domain name Hibu provides for your website is registered to Hibu. Paragraph 8(b) then invites you to notify them if you want it transferred into your name, and says they will assist. Both halves matter, and we are quoting both.
On cancellation, Hibu’s General Terms state that you will no longer be able to access or use the services, that your account may be deactivated or deleted, and that Hibu is not responsible for storing your data or content afterwards. There is also a provision granting you a perpetual right to use written copy Hibu created, provided the service was paid for in full in advance.
Check who your domain is registered to. Today.
This is the single most useful thing on this page, and you do not need us to do it. Look up your domain on any public WHOIS service and see whose name is on the registrant record. If it is not yours, that is worth addressing whether or not you ever move.
To be fair to Hibu: their terms explicitly offer to help transfer the domain into your name if you ask. So this is not a trap door — it is something that stays as it is until you do something about it. We are quoting their document rather than characterising it, and we would encourage you to read paragraph 8 in full.
“The Domain Name we provide you for your website will be registered to us.”
“Please notify us if you wish to transfer the Domain Name to your name, and we will assist you with that process.”
“We are not responsible for storing Your Data or Your Content following cancellation of the Services for any reason.”
What this costs you day to day
The domain may not be in your name
Hibu’s Smart Sites terms state the domain they provide is registered to them. Your domain is the one asset you genuinely cannot afford to lose — every link, every listing and every card points at it.
Cancellation ends access
Hibu’s General Terms state that following cancellation you can no longer access or use the services and your account may be deactivated or deleted.
They are not obliged to keep your content
The terms state Hibu is not responsible for storing your data or content after cancellation. Get a copy before you cancel, not after.
Monthly fees that never become ownership
Three years of payments leaves you exactly where you started: renting. There is no point at which the asset becomes yours.
Changes go through a queue
Every edit is a support request on somebody else’s schedule. For a business that needs to update pricing or hours quickly, that friction is real.
How the rebuild works
Six steps, and your involvement is deliberately minimal. We handle the technical side, bring you recommendations, and come to you when a decision or an approval is genuinely needed. You review the finished site before it goes live.
- 1
We audit your current website
We review your existing site — pages, content, SEO, functionality and structure. We identify what should be improved, updated or dropped, rather than copying over things that were never working.
- 2
We rebuild the site in Next.js
Your branding and content carry over, but the site is rebuilt from the ground up in Next.js. That removes the database and plugin dependencies behind most performance, security and maintenance problems.
For Hibu specifically: Two things happen in parallel. We rebuild from your live site, and we help you sort out the domain — either transferring it into your name using Hibu’s own stated process, or if that proves difficult, securing the right domain for you and redirecting properly. Keep your Hibu service active until the new site is live.
- 3
We improve it while we rebuild it
This is the part people underestimate. We are not handing you a newer version of the same website. We look for real gains in navigation, page layout, calls to action, mobile experience, content and SEO.
- 4
We preserve your SEO
Existing URLs, page titles, metadata and redirects are all accounted for in the transition. The goal is to move platforms without giving up the search visibility you have already built.
- 5
We test everything before it goes live
Desktop and mobile, every form, every piece of functionality, all content reviewed — checked and working before we touch anything in production.
- 6
We launch
Once you approve it, we move the new site into production. From your side the transition should be uneventful, and your visitors should never see an interruption.
What comes with you
- All page content, captured from the live site
- Images at full resolution, re-optimised
- Your branding and business information
- Existing URLs, preserved or 301 redirected
- Your Google Business Profile linkage, updated cleanly
- Your domain — into your name, where it belongs
You own what we build. In writing.
Every rebuild is delivered with a Certificate of Ownership and IP Assignment: a signed document assigning you the copyright in the site code and the content we produce for you, and recording the transfer of the repository, the domain and the hosting account into your name. You are not licensing your website from us. If you ever leave, you take the whole thing with you — the code, the content, the domain, the repository and the deployment history.
- Full copyright assignment in the site code and the content we write for you.
- The Git repository transferred to an account you control, with its full history.
- The domain in your name, at a registrar of your choosing.
- Hosting in your own Vercel account if you want it there — we can manage it, but ownership sits with you.
- No proprietary page builder, no template licence, and nothing that stops working if you stop paying us.
Questions people ask about leaving Hibu
- Does Hibu own my domain?
- Their Smart Sites Service Terms state at paragraph 8(a) that "the Domain Name we provide you for your website will be registered to us." Paragraph 8(b) says to notify them if you want it transferred to your name and they will assist. Note that if you registered your own domain before working with Hibu, this may not apply to you. The reliable answer takes thirty seconds: look up your domain on a public WHOIS service and read the registrant record.
- What happens to my website if I cancel?
- Hibu’s General Terms state that following cancellation you will no longer be able to access or use those services and your account may be deactivated or deleted, and that Hibu is not responsible for storing your data or content afterwards. The practical advice: do not cancel until your new site is live and your content is safely captured.
- Can I keep my content?
- Hibu’s terms include a provision granting a perpetual right to use written copy they created for you, provided the service was paid in full in advance. In practice we capture everything from your live site before anything changes, so the question does not arise.
- Will my Google listing be affected?
- Only positively, if it is handled properly. We keep your URL structure intact through redirects and update your Google Business Profile to point at the new site. Local search rankings should hold and typically improve as the site gets faster.
Sources
Every claim made about Hibu on this page comes from Hibu’s own published documentation. Read them yourself. We would rather you did.
Also worth reading
Thryv
Thryv’s terms state the composition and design of the website they build is their sole and exclusive property.
Read the Thryv pageTownsquare Interactive
Their terms say it plainly: on termination you have no access to, or ownership rights in, the website.
Read the Townsquare Interactive pageDuda
If an agency built your Duda site, the agency holds the account — and Duda will not hand it to you.
Read the Duda page
Start by finding out where you actually are
The free scan tells you what your site is built on, what is slowing it down, what search engines and AI answer engines can currently read, and roughly what a rebuild would cost.
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