SQL Server database migration methods

There are various methods to migrate your SQL Server databases to AWS. You can choose from AWS services and SQL Server native features based on your assessment and requirements. This section describes some of the most common methods, which are summarized in the following two tables. Detailed discussions of some of these methods are included in the sections on Amazon EC2 and Amazon RDS later in this guide.

AWS services

Migration method	Target	Features and limitations	More information
AWS DMS	Amazon EC2 Amazon RDS Amazon RDS Custom Amazon Aurora	Supports full load and CDC Supports all database sizes	AWS DMS section
AWS Migration Hub Orchestrator	Amazon EC2 Amazon RDS	Provides predefined, step-by-step workflow templates Automates native backup and restore Supports all SQL Server editions and versions Can be applied to one or many databases at one time Supports all database sizes	AWS Migration Hub Orchestrator section
AWS Application Migration Service	Amazon EC2	Highly automated lift-and-shift solution Agent-based, block-level replication	Not covered in this guide (see Application Migration Service documentation)
AWS Snowball Edge Edge	Amazon EC2 Amazon RDS Amazon RDS Custom	Supports very large databases (up to 210 TB) Uses Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) for storing and restoring data	Snowball Edge Edge section

SQL Server native methods

Migration method	Target	Features and limitations	More information
Native backup and restore	Amazon EC2 Amazon RDS Amazon RDS Custom	Can be applied to one or many databases at one time Requires downtime Supports all database sizes	Native SQL Server backup/restore section (you can use AWS Migration Hub Orchestrator to automate native backup and restore)
Log shipping	Amazon EC2 Amazon RDS Amazon RDS Custom	Applied per database Can be delayed	Log shipping section
Custom log shipping	Amazon RDS Amazon RDS Custom	Applied per database Can be delayed	Automate on-premises or Amazon EC2 SQL Server to Amazon RDS for SQL Server migration using custom log shipping (AWS blog post)
Database mirroring	Amazon EC2	Applied per database Can be synchronous or asynchronous, based on the SQL Server edition Secondary database isn’t readable; it acts as a standby Supports both automatic and manual failover	Database mirroring section
Always On availability groups	Amazon EC2 Amazon RDS Custom	Applied to a set of user databases Can be synchronous or asynchronous Secondary database is readable (SQL Server Enterprise edition only) Supports both automatic and manual failover Failover can be initiated for multiple databases at a time, at the database group level	Always On availability groups section
Basic Always On availability groups	Amazon EC2	Supported in SQL Server Standard edition Applied to a single user database per availability group Can be synchronous or asynchronous Supports both automatic and manual failover Failover can be initiated at the availability group level Can be used as a hybrid environment between on premises and AWS	Not covered in this guide (see Basic Always On availability groups for a single database in the Microsoft documentation)
Distributed availability groups	Amazon EC2 Amazon RDS Custom (migration only)	Can be used for multi-Region SQL Server deployments Can fail over to a later version of SQL Server Doesn’t require Windows Server Failover Clustering (WSFC) to be extended to the target AWS environment Can be used between Windows-based (source) and Linux-based (target) SQL Server databases Can be used as a hybrid SQL Server deployment between on premises and AWS	Distributed availability groups section
Transactional replication	Amazon EC2 Amazon RDS Amazon RDS Custom	Supports migration of a set of objects (tables, view, stored procedures) Supports asynchronous replication with near real-time data Subscriber database is readable Requires close monitoring of SQL Server replication jobs that perform the replication	Transactional replication section
Bulk copy program (bcp)	Amazon EC2 Amazon RDS Custom	Supports small databases Requires downtime Schema is pre-created at the destination Used for moving data, but not metadata	Not covered in this guide (see Importing and exporting SQL Server data using other methods, Bulk copy section in the Amazon RDS documentation)
Detach and attach	Amazon EC2 Amazon RDS Custom	No backup needed Requires downtime Involves stopping, detaching, copying files, and attaching to Amazon EC2	Not covered in this guide (see Database Detach and Attach in the Microsoft documentation)
Import/export	Amazon EC2 Amazon RDS Amazon RDS Custom	Supports small databases Requires downtime Schema is pre-created at the destination Used for moving data, but not metadata	Not covered in this guide (see Importing and exporting SQL Server data using other methods in the Amazon RDS documentation)