Understanding the Most Common SharePoint Migration Issues
Successful SharePoint migration requires careful planning, precise execution, and thorough validation. Without a structured approach, teams often face data loss, broken permissions, performance bottlenecks, and user adoption challenges. This guide outlines the most common pitfalls and practical ways to prevent them.
1) Incomplete Discovery and Content Cleanup
Skipping discovery leads to surprises during migration—unsupported file types, redundant content, or customizations you didn’t account for.
- Issue: Migrating ROT (redundant, obsolete, trivial) content increases time and cost.
- Issue: Oversized files, illegal characters, and path lengths exceeding limits cause failures.
- Fix: Inventory sites, libraries, lists, versions, and customizations. Clean up ROT, standardize naming, shorten nested folder paths.
- Example: A department library with 400k items and deep folders repeatedly failed until paths were reduced and content was archived.
2) Permissions and Security Mapping Gaps
Complex, item-level permissions often don’t translate cleanly across environments.
- Issue: Broken inheritance and orphaned users after migration.
- Issue: External sharing and guest access not reconfigured in the target environment.
- Fix: Flatten overly granular permissions, map AD to Azure AD, and document group-to-role mappings. Recreate sharing policies post-cutover.
- Example: A site with thousands of unique item permissions caused throttling until permissions were consolidated at the library level.
3) Customizations, Classic-to-Modern Gaps, and Unsupported Features
Not all on-prem or classic features exist in SharePoint Online or modern sites.
- Issue: Custom master pages, sandbox solutions, and full-trust farm solutions won’t migrate as-is.
- Issue: InfoPath forms, legacy workflows (SharePoint Designer), and third-party web parts require re-platforming.
- Fix: Replace classic customizations with SPFx, Power Apps, and Power Automate. Adopt modern site templates and hub site architecture.
- Example: A legacy expense form built in InfoPath was rebuilt in Power Apps with improved validation and mobile support.
4) Metadata, Version History, and Content Types
Misaligned information architecture leads to lost context and search relevance issues.
- Issue: Metadata fields don’t map, breaking filters and views.
- Issue: Version history truncates or inflates storage if not scoped.
- Fix: Standardize content types and columns, migrate the term store first, and set versioning policies. Validate metadata post-migration.
- Example: A document library lost “Client” tagging until the managed metadata term set was migrated and re-linked.
5) Performance, Throttling, and Network Constraints
Large migrations can hit service limits and network bottlenecks.
- Issue: API throttling slows or halts migrations to SharePoint Online.
- Issue: Latency and bandwidth constraints extend timelines.
- Fix: Schedule off-peak runs, use incremental jobs, package content in optimal batches, and leverage approved migration tools with retry logic.
- Example: Breaking a 5TB move into site-by-site batches with deltas cut total time by half.
6) Search, Navigation, and Broken Links
Users depend on discoverability; broken links erode trust.
- Issue: Hard-coded links, classic navigation, and old site URLs fail post-migration.
- Issue: Search results feel “empty” before re-indexing completes.
- Fix: Use relative links, update navigation to modern hubs, plan redirects, and trigger re-indexing. Communicate indexing windows to users.
- Example: A knowledge base site restored link integrity by mapping legacy URLs to new hub sites and rebuilding key pages.
7) Compliance, Retention, and Governance Misalignment
Migrations can unintentionally bypass compliance if policies aren’t aligned in the target environment.
- Issue: Retention labels and DLP policies don’t carry over automatically.
- Issue: Audit and sensitivity labels not enabled before content lands.
- Fix: Deploy compliance policies first, then migrate. Validate label inheritance and auditing on sampled content.
- Example: Contract libraries applied the correct sensitivity labels only after the target policies were pre-configured.
8) Cutover Strategy, Downtime, and User Adoption
Even a technically perfect migration fails without change management.
- Issue: Confusion during cutover, duplicate work in parallel systems, and poor adoption.
- Fix: Choose the right strategy (big bang vs. phased with deltas), freeze changes before final sync, and offer concise training and comms.
- Example: A phased approach with two delta passes reduced data drift and improved confidence at go-live.
9) Tooling Choices and Validation Gaps
Using the wrong tool or skipping validation causes rework.
- Issue: One-size-fits-all tools fail for complex scenarios.
- Issue: No acceptance testing means issues surface after go-live.
- Fix: Pilot with representative sites, compare item counts, metadata, permissions, and versions. Automate reports to spot deltas.
- Example: A pilot revealed missing term sets, preventing a broad failure during full migration.
Practical Checklist to Minimize SharePoint Migration Issues
- Plan: Define scope, timelines, success criteria, and rollback paths.
- Discover: Inventory content, customizations, permissions, and dependencies.
- Clean: Remove ROT, fix names, reduce path length, standardize structure.
- Align: Rebuild information architecture, term store, and compliance policies first.
- Migrate: Use batch strategies, schedule off-peak, and run deltas.
- Validate: Verify counts, versions, metadata, links, and permissions.
- Adopt: Train users, update documentation, and monitor support tickets.
Key Takeaway
Most SharePoint migration issues stem from inadequate discovery, unsupported customizations, and weak validation. By cleaning data, mapping permissions and metadata, planning for modern features, and executing a phased, validated approach, you can deliver a smooth transition that users trust.
