After the decision to use a third-party migration tool, we were initially overwhelmed by the various options available. The market is saturated with many tools all offering different features, functional scopes, and prices. To name a few: ShareGate Desktop, Metalogix Content Matrix by Quest, Avepoint Fly Server, Cognillo SharePoint Migration Tool, or Saketa SharePoint migrator.

It is easy to lose track of all the different possibilities. Therefore, we created a list of selected attributes by which the different tools could be filtered and sorted according to our needs. Some of these were required, such as the support for SharePoint 2019 as the source system and SharePoint Online as the target system, and some were just preferences, like for example the pricing. Additionally, some attributes were evaluated by testing with trial versions of the tools, like the reliability or performance of a tool. Fortunately, the companies offering the tools often provide a trial version for these purposes that can be acquired by filling out a form or contacting them by email.
The examined attributes included:

• Available source and target systems
• Functional scope:
  • Migration of whole sites, document libraries, lists, or files
  • Migration of files while retaining the full version history and other metadata (last modified, modified by, created by, etc.)
  • Migration of Access rights/Permissions
  • Migration of Active Site features
  • Migration of Site navigation
  • Incremental migration of updated or new files after initial migration
  • Monitoring capabilities for the migration process
• Price
• Performance
• Reliability

With this procedure, it was easy to narrow down the available tools to a few that could be compared very effectively.

In the next part, we look at how to prepare for the SharePoint migration.