A good AWS migration timeline is phased, tested and risk-led.
The safest migrations are not rushed into production. They move through discovery, assessment, planning, preparation, testing, controlled migration waves and post-migration optimisation.
Typical AWS migration phases
Discovery
Understand the environment and gather workload information.
Assessment
Review technical readiness, cost, security, dependencies and risk.
Planning
Define migration waves, ownership, timeline, rollback routes and success criteria.
AWS preparation
Landing zone, networking, IAM, security, backup, logging, monitoring and deployment routes.
Test migration
Validate the migration approach with lower-risk workloads or test environments.
Production migration
Move workloads in controlled waves with testing and rollback options.
Optimisation
Tune AWS cost, performance, resilience, security and operations.
What affects migration timelines?
Effort and duration depend on workload complexity and the level of risk you're prepared to carry.
- Number of applications
- Complexity of dependencies
- Database size and change rate
- Downtime tolerance
- Security and compliance requirements
- Network complexity
- Testing requirements
- Internal availability
- Existing documentation quality
- Rehost, replatform or refactor mix
Avoiding the "big bang" migration
Unless the environment is very simple, most AWS migrations should avoid a single high-risk cutover. A phased approach gives the team time to test assumptions, validate rollback plans, learn from early waves and reduce production risk.
Frequently asked questions
Planning an AWS migration?
Start with a practical assessment before committing to a full migration project. IG CloudOps will help you understand what should move, what should change, what could go wrong, and what the next step should be.
Book an AWS migration assessment