Migration and Transfer Related Services

1. AWS Migration Hub

AWS Migration Hub is a service that helps businesses plan, track, and manage the migration of applications, servers, and databases from on-premises systems or other clouds into AWS. Instead of monitoring each migration tool separately, Migration Hub provides a centralized dashboard where companies can see the progress and status of all migration activities in one place. It integrates with various AWS migration services and partner tools to simplify large-scale cloud migration projects. The service helps organizations reduce complexity, monitor dependencies, and organize migration workflows more efficiently. It is commonly used by enterprises moving large IT infrastructures to AWS.

Example:
A company shifting hundreds of office servers and databases from its local data center to AWS can use AWS Migration Hub to track migration progress, monitor resources, and manage the entire migration project from a single dashboard.

2. AWS Application Migration Service

AWS Application Migration Service is a service that helps businesses move applications and servers from physical data centers, virtual machines, or other cloud platforms into AWS with minimal downtime. The service continuously replicates source servers into AWS and automatically converts them into AWS-compatible infrastructure during migration. It supports large-scale migrations without requiring major changes to the applications being moved. AWS handles replication, testing, and recovery processes, making migrations faster and less complex for companies. It is commonly used by organizations modernizing their infrastructure or moving legacy systems to the cloud.

Example:
A company running old business applications on local VMware servers can use AWS Application Migration Service to move those servers into AWS without rebuilding the applications from scratch.

3. Application Discovery Service

AWS Application Discovery Service is a service that helps businesses collect information about their existing servers, applications, and infrastructure before migrating to AWS. It automatically gathers data such as server usage, network connections, application dependencies, and performance metrics so companies can better understand how their systems work. This information helps organizations plan cloud migrations more accurately and avoid problems during the migration process. The service is especially useful for large enterprises with complex IT environments and many interconnected applications. AWS also integrates the collected data with AWS Migration Hub for centralized migration planning and tracking.

Example:
A large company preparing to move its data center to AWS can use AWS Application Discovery Service to identify which servers communicate with each other and understand application dependencies before migration begins.

4. Database Migration Service

AWS Database Migration Service is a managed service that helps businesses move databases from on-premises systems, other cloud providers, or different database engines into AWS with minimal downtime. It supports both homogeneous migrations, such as Oracle to Oracle, and heterogeneous migrations, such as Oracle to PostgreSQL or MySQL. AWS DMS continuously replicates data from the source database to the target database while applications continue running, reducing service interruptions during migration. It supports relational databases, NoSQL databases, and data warehouses, making it useful for modernization projects and cloud adoption. AWS automatically handles scaling, monitoring, and migration infrastructure management.

Example:
A company using Microsoft SQL Server in its local data center can use AWS Database Migration Service to move its database into Amazon RDS or Amazon Aurora without shutting down the application for long periods.

5. AWS Transfer Family

AWS Transfer Family is a fully managed service that allows businesses to securely transfer files into and out of AWS storage services using traditional file transfer protocols. It supports protocols such as SFTP, FTPS, FTP, and AS2, making it easier for organizations to work with existing file transfer systems without changing their applications or workflows. AWS Transfer Family integrates directly with Amazon S3 and Amazon EFS for secure cloud storage and automatically handles scaling, security, monitoring, and infrastructure management. It is commonly used for exchanging files with customers, partners, vendors, and enterprise systems. The service helps companies modernize file transfer operations while still supporting legacy business processes.

Example:
A retail company can use AWS Transfer Family to securely receive inventory and sales data files from suppliers through SFTP and automatically store them in Amazon S3 for processing and analytics.

6. AWS Snow Family

AWS Snow Family is a group of physical devices provided by AWS that help businesses transfer large amounts of data between on-premises systems and the AWS cloud. Instead of transferring huge datasets over the internet, companies can load data onto Snow devices and physically ship them to AWS data centers, which is often faster and more practical for petabytes of data. The Snow Family includes services like Snowcone, Snowball, and Snowmobile, each designed for different storage and transfer needs. These devices also support edge computing, allowing applications to process data in remote or disconnected locations before sending it to AWS. The service is commonly used for data center migrations, backups, media transfers, and large-scale analytics projects.

Example:
A movie production company generating hundreds of terabytes of raw video footage can use AWS Snowball devices to physically transfer the data to AWS for cloud-based editing, storage, and processing instead of uploading it over a slow internet connection.

7. DataSync

AWS DataSync is a managed data transfer service that helps businesses quickly and securely move large amounts of data between on-premises storage systems, AWS storage services, and other cloud environments. It automates tasks such as copying files, scheduling transfers, validating data integrity, and optimizing network usage, making data migration and synchronization much easier. AWS DataSync supports services like Amazon S3, EFS, FSx, and object storage systems, and it can transfer data much faster than traditional manual copy methods. It is commonly used for cloud migrations, backups, disaster recovery, and syncing active datasets between environments. AWS automatically handles encryption, monitoring, and scaling during transfers.

Example:
A media company can use AWS DataSync to continuously transfer and synchronize terabytes of video files from its local storage servers into Amazon S3 for cloud-based editing and archiving.

8. AWS Transform

AWS Transform is an AI-powered modernization service that helps businesses migrate and transform old applications, infrastructure, and code into modern cloud-based systems on AWS. It uses agentic AI to automate complex tasks such as code analysis, refactoring, dependency mapping, migration planning, and application transformation. AWS Transform is mainly designed for organizations modernizing legacy systems like .NET applications, VMware environments, and mainframe workloads. The service helps reduce the time, cost, and manual effort required for large-scale cloud modernization projects. It also provides collaborative workspaces and automation tools to help teams manage migrations more efficiently.

Example:
A large bank running old COBOL-based mainframe applications can use AWS Transform to analyze and modernize its legacy systems into cloud-native applications running on AWS.

9. AWS Mainframe Modernization

AWS Mainframe Modernization is a service that helps businesses migrate, modernize, and run old mainframe applications on AWS cloud infrastructure. Many large organizations still use legacy mainframe systems built with technologies like COBOL for banking, insurance, airline, and government operations. AWS Mainframe Modernization provides tools and managed runtime environments to move these applications to the cloud without completely rebuilding them from scratch. Companies can either replatform existing applications with minimal code changes or refactor them into modern cloud-native architectures. The service helps reduce mainframe costs, improve scalability, and integrate legacy systems with modern AWS services.

Example:
A large insurance company using decades-old COBOL applications on expensive mainframe hardware can use AWS Mainframe Modernization to move those applications into AWS while continuing to support existing business operations.

10. Amazon Elastic VMware Service

VMware Cloud on AWS is a cloud service jointly developed by AWS and VMware that allows businesses to run VMware workloads directly on AWS infrastructure without changing their existing VMware tools and applications. Companies using VMware in their own data centers can extend or migrate their environments into AWS while keeping the same virtualization technologies, management tools, and workflows. The service helps organizations move to the cloud faster without rebuilding applications or retraining IT teams completely. It is commonly used for hybrid cloud setups, disaster recovery, data center migration, and scaling enterprise applications. AWS provides the cloud infrastructure while VMware software handles virtualization and management.

Example:
A company already running hundreds of VMware virtual machines in its local data center can use VMware Cloud on AWS to move those workloads into AWS without redesigning its existing infrastructure setup.