Authorised AWS Partner

How to Migrate from On-Premise to AWS in India — 2026 Guide

Indian businesses migrate to AWS for cost optimisation, scalability, and to retire ageing on-prem infrastructure. This guide covers the AWS-recommended migration framework adapted for Indian regulatory + connectivity realities. Based on our deployment experience for 50+ Indian businesses across BFSI, manufacturing, IT services, and e-commerce.

Discovery and assessment (2-4 weeks): Run AWS Application Discovery Service (or third-party tools — RVTools for VMware, Cloudamize) across your on-prem estate. Catalogue: VMs (CPU, RAM, disk, network), applications, databases, dependencies, current utilisation patterns, RTO/RPO requirements, compliance/data-residency constraints. Output: server-by-server migration plan with target AWS configuration and TCO comparison.
Define migration strategy per app (the "6 Rs"): For each app, choose: (1) Rehost — lift-and-shift, minimal change (fastest), (2) Replatform — minor optimisations (e.g., MySQL → RDS Aurora), (3) Repurchase — drop and replace with SaaS (e.g., Exchange → M365), (4) Refactor — re-architect for cloud-native (slowest, highest reward), (5) Retain — keep on-prem (regulatory, latency), (6) Retire — decommission. Most Indian SMB migrations are 60-70% Rehost + 20-25% Replatform + small Refactor.
Plan landing zone and networking: Set up AWS Organizations with multiple accounts (production, staging, dev, security, networking, shared services). Configure VPC architecture: typical 3-tier VPC in Mumbai region, optionally DR VPC in Hyderabad region. Plan connectivity: AWS Direct Connect (private link from your data centre — typically 1 Gbps via Tata/Airtel/Sify, ₹50K-2L/month) or VPN over internet for smaller workloads. Set up Transit Gateway for hub-spoke connectivity.
Build foundation: IAM, security, monitoring: IAM: define roles, policies, MFA-enforced. Use AWS SSO with your AD/Entra/JumpCloud. Security baselines: enable Security Hub, GuardDuty (threat detection), Inspector (vulnerability scanning), CloudTrail (audit logs), AWS Config (compliance). Monitoring: CloudWatch dashboards per app, alarms for critical thresholds. Budgets: set monthly budgets per cost centre with alerts.
Pilot migration (1-3 apps, 4-6 weeks): Pick low-risk apps for first migration: typically internal tools, dev/test environments, non-customer-facing apps. Use AWS Application Migration Service (MGN) for Rehost — continuous block-level replication from on-prem to AWS, cutover with minimal downtime (typically 5-30 min). Validate functionality, performance, monitoring. Document runbooks. Build team confidence before production migration.
Migrate production workloads (8-26 weeks depending on estate size): Wave-based migration: group apps by dependency (apps that talk to each other migrate together). Wave 1: stateless web apps. Wave 2: app servers. Wave 3: databases (often longest — use AWS DMS for low-downtime DB migration). Wave 4: external integrations. Wave 5: legacy systems. Each wave: pilot in staging, cutover during maintenance window, monitor for 1-2 weeks, mark complete. Indian businesses often align cutovers with end-of-quarter or year-end change-freezes.
Optimise post-migration (ongoing): Post-migration, optimisation is where real savings come. Right-sizing: most lifted-and-shifted instances are over-provisioned vs cloud-native sizing — typically 20-40% savings via right-sizing in first 90 days. Reserved Instances / Savings Plans: commit 70-80% of baseline for 1-3 year terms, save 30-50%. Spot for non-critical batch. S3 lifecycle for backup tiering. Aurora for high-performance DBs. Auto-scaling for variable web traffic. We do quarterly cost review for managed clients.
Build DR strategy (Mumbai + Hyderabad multi-region): AWS India has two regions: ap-south-1 (Mumbai) and ap-south-2 (Hyderabad). For business-critical workloads, run active in Mumbai with pilot-light or warm-standby in Hyderabad. Cross-region replication for S3, Aurora Global Database for DB, AMI replication for EC2. RTO 30-60 min, RPO 5-15 min are typical for warm-standby setup. Test DR semi-annually.
Compliance and DPDP readiness: For DPDP-regulated workloads: keep personal data in India regions only (configure AWS Region restrictions via SCPs). Enable AWS Backup with India-region retention. For BFSI: enable additional logging for RBI / SEBI compliance. Use AWS Config rules for compliance baselines. Implement data classification + DLP (Amazon Macie for S3) for PII discovery.

Frequently Asked Questions

How long does a typical Indian SMB migration take?

Small (5-20 servers): 8-16 weeks. Medium (20-100 servers): 16-32 weeks. Large (100-500 servers): 6-18 months. Enterprise (500+ servers or complex BFSI/manufacturing estates): 1-3 years phased. Pilots can start within 4-6 weeks of project kickoff for confidence building.

What does migration cost?

Three cost categories: (1) Tooling — AWS MGN/DMS are typically under $0.05/server/hour during replication phase. (2) Professional services — typically ₹2-15 lakh for SMB, ₹15-1 crore+ for enterprise depending on scope. (3) Parallel running costs — 2-3 months of running both on-prem + AWS during transition. Most migrations pay back in 12-24 months via TCO reduction (typically 30-50% lower vs on-prem refresh).

Can we keep some workloads on-prem (hybrid)?

Yes, very common pattern for Indian businesses. AWS Outposts (AWS hardware in your data centre) for regulatory / latency-sensitive workloads. AWS Direct Connect for low-latency hybrid connectivity. AWS Storage Gateway for hybrid storage. Many Indian BFSI clients keep core banking on-prem and migrate non-regulated workloads (CRM, analytics, internal apps) to AWS.

What about data transfer — moving 50 TB to AWS over internet takes forever

For >10 TB: AWS Snowball Edge (encrypted physical device, ships to AWS data centre, load into S3) — typical Indian shipment + ingest takes 7-14 days. For >500 TB: AWS Snowmobile (truck-sized appliance, currently US-only but expansion planned). For ongoing transfer: AWS DataSync over leased line. Combine: bulk historical via Snowball, ongoing delta via DataSync.

How do we choose between AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud for India?

AWS: largest service catalogue, deepest Indian partner ecosystem, two Indian regions. Azure: best for Microsoft-stack workloads (Exchange, SQL Server, Windows AD), enterprise sales presence. Google Cloud: strongest for data analytics + ML workloads, India region in Mumbai. For most Indian SMBs and mid-market: AWS is the safest default unless heavy Microsoft footprint (then Azure). We help with platform selection.

Free 2-week AWS migration assessment — we deliver discovery report + TCO comparison + phased migration plan.