How to Rebuild a Squarespace Website With AI

Introduction

Squarespace makes good-looking websites. That's what keeps people on it. But if you've ever tried to do something your template doesn't support, you know how quickly you hit a wall. Move a section, change a layout, add something custom, and suddenly you're fighting the tool instead of building your site.

AI tools have gotten good enough to build sites that look just as polished as Squarespace, but without the template constraints. And if you already have a Squarespace site, you can migrate your content over automatically instead of starting from scratch.

In this guide, I'll show you how to migrate a Squarespace website into a new AI tool called Repaint.

Why Rebuild a Squarespace Website?

AI website builders are easier to keep up to date than Squarespace. Instead of manually adjusting blocks, previewing, and tweaking spacing every time you need a change, you describe what you want and the AI handles it. That makes it realistic to keep your site current as your business changes.

The reason most people haven't switched is that rebuilding a site from scratch is a lot of work. AI tools solve that too. You can migrate your existing Squarespace content automatically and build a new site around it, so you don't lose what you already have.

How AI Website Migration Works

Squarespace doesn't let you export your website. Repaint works around this by scanning your published site. It visits each page, downloads your images, reads your text, and takes screenshots to understand the layout. Then it builds you a new website that you can edit by chatting with AI. Once you're happy with it, you transfer your domain and you're done.

The result won't be pixel-perfect. AI migration gets you about 80% of the way there, which is a lot better than starting from a blank page. From there, you refine by chatting with the AI until it's right.

Step 1: Import Your Content

To get started, visit Repaint. Right at the top, give it the link to your Squarespace website. Repaint will scan your published site, pull in your text and images, and take screenshots of each page.

Your site needs to be live for this to work. It can be any live website, including a subdomain like yoursite.squarespace.com on a Squarespace trial.

Once Repaint has a good picture of your site, it'll start asking questions to plan the rebuild. You don't need to prepare anything.

Step 2: Plan Your New Website

Repaint won't jump straight into building. It asks a few questions first to understand what you want: which pages to keep, whether to reorganize anything, and what style to go for. This takes about 3-5 messages. Then it writes out a plan for you to review before generating anything.

If you're not sure what you want, that's fine. You can let Repaint propose a plan. If you don't like what it makes, you can always ask it to try again. You're not locked into your first attempt.

Plan the Content

The simplest approach is to bring everything over as-is. Same pages, same text, same images. If your current site structure works and you just want a better tool to manage it, this is the way to go.

But if your site has grown messy over time, this is a chance to clean it up. Squarespace sites often have pages that were added to fit the template rather than because they made sense for the business. If you have a "Gallery" page because the template came with one, or an "About" section that's really just filler, this is a good time to cut it. You can tell Repaint which pages to keep and which to skip, or ask it to suggest a simpler structure based on what it found.

If your Squarespace site has a blog or portfolio, you can bring those over too. Start with just a few posts to make sure the layout looks right, then import the rest. More broadly, if your site has more than 20 pages, importing all of them in one shot will likely hit the free tier usage limit. You'll be prompted to upgrade to continue. For large sites, start with a small sample, then bring over the rest after you've seen the initial site.

Plan the Style

You have a lot of options for styles on your new site. All you have to do is tell Repaint what you want. You can:

• Recreate your current look
• Match the style of another website you like
• Pick from Repaint's style library
• Describe a custom style
• Let Repaint decide

Repaint can pull in your existing brand colors and fonts regardless of which direction you go. If you liked your Squarespace design, it may be simplest to have it copy the original. Then later you can make changes without the template constraints.

Review the plan

Before generating anything, Repaint writes out exactly what it's going to build: which pages, what content, and what style. Look it over and make any last changes. It's a lot faster to fix the plan than to regenerate the whole site.

Once you confirm, Repaint will build your new website!

Step 3: Generate Your Website

Once you approve the plan, Repaint builds your site. A few pages takes a couple minutes. A larger site with dozens of pages can take ten minutes or more.

When it's done, take a look through the result. The first version usually has some rough spots: text that got cut off, images in the wrong place, or spacing that's a bit off. That's expected. You'll fix these in the next step.

Squarespace's built-in animations (fade-ins, scroll reveals, parallax effects) usually don't transfer automatically. The AI can see the final state of a page but not how elements animate into view. If your site relied on these effects, you'll need to describe them to Repaint so it can recreate them.

If you were using Squarespace's member areas, scheduling, or commerce features, those won't carry over directly. Repaint can build pages that serve the same purpose, but you may need to connect third-party tools (like Calendly for scheduling or Shopify for e-commerce) to replace the Squarespace-specific functionality.

Step 4: Make Adjustments

After generating your site, you can make changes by chatting with Repaint. This is where the experience feels most different from Squarespace. Instead of rearranging blocks within a template's constraints, you just describe what you want. "Move the testimonials above the pricing section." "Make this a two-column layout." "Add a full-width image between these sections." Things that would have been impossible or painful in your Squarespace template become simple requests.

Start by evaluating the overall visual style, like colors, fonts, and layouts. It's the foundation that everything is built on. If you decide to change it later, it can reshape the whole site and effectively undo any detail-polishing work you did.

Once you're happy with the overall style, you can work through the finer details: making sure text is accurate, images are in the right places, links work, and spacing looks right on every page.

Review SEO

If your Squarespace site was getting search traffic, SEO is worth paying attention to during your migration. Google ranks individual pages, not websites. Each page on your site has built up its own ranking over time, and that ranking is tied to its specific URL. If you move to a new platform and those URLs change or disappear, Google treats them as new pages with no history, and you lose the traffic they were earning.

Squarespace generally uses clean URL structures, which makes matching them easier. Ask Repaint to compare the URLs on your old site with the new one and set up redirects for any that changed. Repaint can help with this.

When your site looks good and the content is correct, you're ready to publish.

Step 5: Publish

When you're ready, hit the Publish button in the top right corner. Your site goes live on a Repaint URL that you can share with anyone. It will look something like this: https://xxxxxx-xxxxxx-xxxxxx.sites.repaint.com

This makes it a real website on the internet. You can open it on your phone, send it to a friend, or post it on social media.

At this point, you have two websites live: one on Repaint, and one on Squarespace. Your domain is still pointing to your Squarespace site, so nothing has changed for your visitors yet. When you're ready to make the switch, you can transfer your domain to point to the new one.

Step 6: Transfer Your Domain

When you're ready to go live, you need to point your domain to Repaint. Go to Website Settings > Domains and click Connect a Custom Domain. This requires a paid plan. You can see pricing details here.

Squarespace is two things: a website builder and a domain registrar. They purchased Google Domains in 2023, so managing domains is now a core part of their business. These two services are completely separate. You can cancel your Squarespace website builder subscription and keep your domain registered there with no issues. You don't need to move your domain anywhere. You just update the settings in your Squarespace account so your domain points to Repaint instead of your old site.

If your domain is registered somewhere else, like GoDaddy, Namecheap, or Cloudflare, you'll update the settings there instead.

If you've never done this before, don't worry. Ask Repaint to walk you through it. It'll tell you exactly what to do based on your provider, step by step.

The change can take a few hours to take effect. Once Repaint shows your domain as verified, you're live. You can cancel your Squarespace website builder subscription whenever you're ready. Your domain registration is separate and stays active.

Conclusion

Squarespace sites look great, but keeping them updated is a lot of manual work. AI tools make it realistic to actually maintain your site over time, because changes that used to mean an hour in the editor now take a sentence. You can bring your content over without starting from scratch, keep your domain on Squarespace, and manage your site going forward by just describing what you want.

FAQ

How long does a Squarespace migration take?

It usually takes 3-15 minutes to plan the site, import your content, and generate the new website. Afterwards, time-to-publish depends on how many adjustments you need to make, and if you have to import more content. Most sites can be migrated within a few hours at most.

Will my new site look as good as my Squarespace site?

It can. Squarespace templates have a specific aesthetic, and Repaint can recreate that look or build something new that's just as polished. The difference is that you're not locked into the template's layout anymore.

Will my site look the same on mobile?

Repaint builds responsive sites that adapt to all screen sizes automatically. If something looks off on a specific screen size, you can ask Repaint to adjust it.

Will my forms still work after migrating?

Yes. Repaint can create contact forms that send emails to your inbox. If you were using Squarespace's built-in forms, Repaint will recreate that functionality. If you use a third-party form tool, you may need to share the embed code.

What about Squarespace scheduling or member areas?

These are Squarespace-specific features. For scheduling, you can connect a tool like Calendly or Acuity Scheduling. For member areas, you'd need a third-party membership platform. Repaint can build the pages and integrate these tools, but you'll need to set up the external service.

What happens to my Squarespace site during the migration?

While you're migrating, nothing happens to your Squarespace site. It's completely separate. All you're doing is building a new site in Repaint. Then once you're happy with the new site, you can transfer your domain to point to the new one. Or if you decide to keep your Squarespace site, there's no need to do anything.

Can I migrate a Squarespace site with e-commerce?

Partially. Repaint can build product pages and a storefront, but it doesn't handle checkout or payments. You'd need to connect a service like Shopify or Stripe for that. If your store uses embeddable checkout widgets, share the embed code with Repaint.

Can I migrate just one page to try it out?

Yes. You can import just one page to try it out. This is a good way to see if Repaint is a good fit for your business. Once you're happy with the result, you can ask Repaint to build the rest of your site.

How much does it cost to migrate from Squarespace to Repaint?

It's free to generate a site and start editing. The main restrictions of free plans are that you have limited usage, can't add a custom domain, and the site will have a Repaint badge. Paid plans start at $20/month billed annually, or $25/month billed monthly. That includes expanded usage, custom domain support, and it removes the Repaint badge.

What happens when the AI makes a mistake? Can I undo individual changes?

As you make updates, Repaint saves every version of your site. You can ask Repaint to go back, and it will revert to a previous version. Or if you want to go back to a specific point in time, you can restore any previous versions manually.