Migrate your file share to SharePoint Online with confidence
You've got terabytes of files across legacy servers, deep folder structures that break SharePoint's path limits, and no clear plan for what to keep. ShareGate Migrate lets you filter content by date range, map users to their destination permissions, and run batched migrations on your schedule.
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How it works
A clean migration from start to finish
Pre-migration source analysis
Scan your file share to identify path violations and oversized files before migration starts.
Scheduled, batched migration runs
Per-item post-migration reports
Generate a categorized report of errors, warnings, and successes after each job.
NTFS permission mapping at destination
Recreate unique and broken-inheritance NTFS permissions at the destination via user mapping.
What ShareGate Migrate covers for file share migrations
Surface path and file issues before migration
Before you move a single file, ShareGate Migrate's Source Analysis scans your file share and flags items that exceed SharePoint Online's 400-character path limit or 250GB file size constraint. These are Microsoft and SharePoint Online requirements, not ShareGate limits. Surfacing them early means you can remediate before cutover instead of discovering failures mid-migration.
Run batched migrations on your own schedule
The ShareGate Migrate time range filter lets you scope each migration run to files created or modified within a specific date window, so you can migrate four years of content without touching the rest. You can schedule runs outside business hours and use incremental passes to pick up files modified since the last job. Note that deletions on the source do not propagate to the destination.
Read per-item results after each completed job
After each migration job, ShareGate Migrate generates a per-item report with categorized errors, warnings, and version history so you know exactly what landed and what needs attention. Permission reporting at the destination is available via the Permissions Matrix Report — there is no source-side permission report on the file share itself.
Where Migration Manager requires more manual effort at scale
Frequently asked questions
Two main options exist for migrating Windows file servers and NAS drives to SharePoint Online: Microsoft Migration Manager, built into the SharePoint admin center, and third-party tools like ShareGate Migrate. Migration Manager handles file share migrations and works well for straightforward scenarios, but complex folder structures, broken NTFS inheritance, and large-scale environments often require significant manual remediation when issues surface during or after migration runs. ShareGate Migrate's Source Analysis scans your file share before migration starts and flags items that exceed SharePoint Online's 400-character path limit or 250GB file size constraint, so you can remediate before cutover. After each migration job, ShareGate Migrate generates a per-item report with categorized errors and warnings, giving you a clear picture of what landed and what needs attention. Note that permission reporting is post-migration only via the Permissions Matrix Report at the destination — there is no source-side permission report on the file share itself.
SharePoint Online enforces a 400-character limit on file and folder paths, and many legacy file servers have deep or nested folder structures that exceed this limit. Microsoft Migration Manager will surface these violations during migration runs, which means you may discover path failures only after the job has already attempted to move those files. ShareGate Migrate's Source Analysis scans your file share before migration begins and flags any items that exceed SharePoint Online's path limit, file size cap of 250GB, or other Microsoft-imposed constraints, so you can shorten paths or restructure folders before the migration runs. These are SharePoint Online requirements, not ShareGate Migrate limitations. Catching them early is what separates a clean cutover from a weekend of post-migration cleanup.
Don’t just migrate it. ShareGate it.