Migration · Cost
Data center migration cost
A migration costs $8,000–$20,000 per rack before hardware refresh. That range covers labour, logistics, the network build, the months where you pay for both sites, and the exit. The model below is the same one the calculator uses, so you can see exactly which assumption is driving your number — and change it.
Migration cost estimator
| Line | Estimate |
|---|---|
| Labour and project management | — |
| Physical logistics | — |
| Network and circuits | — |
| Dual-running overlap | — |
| Decommission and exit | — |
| Migration subtotal | — |
| Hardware refresh (capex, separate decision) | — |
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Estimates, not quotes. Rates come from the Colocation Price Index; the per-rack coefficients are the benchmarks documented below. For real numbers, request quotes.
Data center relocation cost: what the estimate includes
In procurement, data center relocation usually means the physical and operational move between facilities; data center migration can also include rebuilding or replatforming workloads. Both require the same core budget lines: discovery and project labour, insured logistics, target-site network, dual-running, decommissioning and any hardware refresh. The calculator keeps those lines separate so a low transport quote is not mistaken for the full relocation cost.
A same-metro relocation with reusable hardware tends toward the lower end of the $8,000–$20,000 per-rack migration range. Cross-country or cross-border moves, regulated workloads, long carrier lead times and a large refresh programme push the total upward. Use the target-market rate and actual kW per rack above, then request like-for-like facility quotes before approving the business case.
The model, line by line
Every coefficient below is visible in the calculator and adjustable through its inputs. They are benchmarks for enterprise-scale programmes — if a vendor estimate diverges sharply from one of these lines, that divergence is the question worth asking, not the total.
| Line | Basis used here | What moves it |
|---|---|---|
| Labour and PM | $4,000 / rack × complexity | Discovery depth, number of applications per rack, how much validation the business demands. Regulated estates carry documentation overhead that standard ones do not. |
| Logistics | $1,200 / rack × complexity | Distance, whether cabinets move or only their contents, insurance value, and how much of the estate is retired instead of transported. |
| Network | $25,000 + $4,000 / month | Carrier count, whether dark fibre or waves are needed between sites, cross-connect volume at the target. Fixed portion is circuit installation and engineering. |
| Dual-running | racks × kW × rate × months | Programme length, full stop. This is the line that rewards schedule discipline and punishes a wave plan that drifts. |
| Decommission | $900 / rack | Certified data destruction, disposal, cabinet clearance. Any early-termination charge in the outgoing contract sits on top and is negotiable more often than teams assume. |
| Hardware refresh | $60,000 / rack refreshed | A placeholder for a mid-density rack of current-generation compute. Your own procurement numbers should replace it — this line exists to keep the capex visible, not to price it. |
Share of budget
Across a full programme including refresh, the shares typically land like this. Use them to check whether an estimate is shaped like a real migration: if labour is 10% and logistics is 40%, someone has priced a house move rather than a data center migration.
| Cost driver | Share | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
| Labour and project management | 30–40% | Internal time plus any migration partner. Dominates every migration budget and is the line most often left out of the first estimate. |
| New hardware and refresh | 20–35% | Equipment replaced rather than moved. Often the largest discretionary lever: a migration is the cheapest moment to retire old kit. |
| Network and circuits | 10–20% | New circuits, the temporary inter-site link, cross-connects and the overlap period where both sites are billed. |
| Dual-running overlap | 10–15% | Paying for both sites simultaneously. Directly proportional to how long the wave programme runs — the strongest argument for a tight schedule. |
| Physical logistics | 5–10% | Packing, specialist transport, insurance, receiving, racking, cabling. |
| Decommission and exit | 3–8% | Certified data destruction, disposal, cabinet clearance, and any early-termination charge. |
The costs teams forget
- Cross-connect recurring charges. Cheap per unit, permanent, and easy to under-count by half at design time.
- Billing that does not stop. The outgoing provider keeps invoicing until someone confirms the space is returned in writing.
- Licence re-issue. Hardware-locked and site-locked licences need lead time and sometimes money.
- Internal time. Application owners spend real hours on validation. It is a cost even when no invoice records it.
- The second freight run. Something always gets left behind, and the return trip is never in the plan.
Frequently asked
What is a realistic per-rack cost for a data center migration?
$8,000–$20,000 per rack for the migration itself — labour, logistics, network build, dual-running and decommissioning — excluding any hardware refresh. Below $8,000 usually means dual-running or decommissioning has been left out of the estimate. Above $20,000 usually means long distance, heavy compliance requirements, or an unusually long wave programme.
Why is labour the largest line item?
Because a migration is mostly discovery, design, coordination and validation, and those are people-hours. Dependency mapping alone runs for weeks, every wave needs change management and post-move validation, and the programme carries a full-time migration lead for its entire duration. The trucks are one weekend per wave.
How do we reduce migration cost without adding risk?
Compress the wave programme — dual-running cost is linear in programme length and is the one large line that shrinks with nothing but schedule discipline. Retire rather than move anything near end of warranty, which cuts both logistics and failure risk. And negotiate the target contract on measured power draw rather than nameplate, so you are not paying for capacity you will never use.
Should migration cost be capex or opex?
Mostly opex: labour, logistics, dual-running and decommissioning are all operating expense in the period they occur. Hardware refresh is the capex component, which is a further reason to separate it from the migration budget — mixing them makes the migration look far more expensive than it is and hides a decision that should be evaluated on its own.
What is included in data center relocation cost?
A complete relocation budget includes discovery and project labour, insured packing and transport, target-site network and cross-connects, the period when both sites run, decommissioning and contract exit. Hardware refresh is a separate capex decision. A freight-only quote therefore represents only one part of the programme cost.
Get real numbers for your migration
The calculator gives the shape of the budget; operators give the rate. Send the footprint once — we return quotes from facilities that fit, benchmarked against the Index.