GCP migrations have a quieter cost story than AWS or Azure. There is no equivalent of Azure Hybrid Benefit, no headline MAP-scale credit pool, and Google does not market the migration programme aggressively. Yet for data-heavy workloads and for compute estates that run steady-state production loads, GCP frequently lands as the cheapest destination, driven by automatic sustained-use discounts, Custom Machine Types that right-size at the SKU level, and the storage-compute separation in BigQuery. This page is the cost reference for on-premise to GCP migration in 2026.
The GCP 7Rs framework follows the same shape as AWS and Azure, with one practical difference. Custom Machine Types on Compute Engine let customers right-size compute at the vCPU and memory granularity rather than picking from pre-defined SKUs, which often reduces over-provisioning during lift-and-shift. The blended cost for a 60-30-10 rehost, replatform, retire mix on GCP typically lands at $11,000 to $13,000 per workload before egress and dual-running, similar to Azure for non-Microsoft estates.
Per-workload GCP migration cost by strategy
| Strategy | Per workload (low) | Per workload (typical) | Per workload (high) | Timeline per workload |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rehost (lift-and-shift to Compute Engine) | $2,800 | $5,200 | $7,800 | 2 to 4 weeks |
| Replatform (Cloud SQL, App Engine, GKE) | $7,500 | $15,500 | $24,000 | 4 to 12 weeks |
| Refactor (Cloud Run, Cloud Functions, GKE Autopilot) | $22,000 | $48,000 | $78,000 | 12 to 48 weeks |
| Repurchase (Google Workspace, Vertex AI Search) | $10,000 | $32,000 | $140,000 | 8 to 26 weeks |
| Relocate (Google Cloud VMware Engine) | $5,000 | $9,000 | $15,000 | 2 to 8 weeks |
The sustained-use discount is one of the simplest cost levers in cloud and one of the most underused in migration cost modelling. Google applies a tiered discount automatically to any Compute Engine instance that runs for a significant portion of the calendar month. The first 25 percent of the month earns no discount, the next 25 percent earns 20 percent off, the next 25 percent earns 40 percent off, and the final 25 percent earns 60 percent off. The structure is documented in the public Sustained-use discounts documentation.
A workload that runs 24x7 for the entire month earns an effective 30 percent discount against the on-demand rate. No reservation. No upfront commitment. No contract renegotiation. Compared with AWS On-Demand pricing without Savings Plans, GCP's automatic discount produces a 25 to 30 percent cost reduction on steady-state production workloads. For migration cost modelling, the practical implication is that the parallel-running cost on GCP is materially lower than on AWS at equivalent compute scale because the parallel-run workloads typically run 24x7 and earn the full sustained-use discount automatically.
Where GCP wins on price
Migrate to Virtual Machines (M4VMs, formerly Velostrata, now part of Google Cloud Migration Center) is the primary lift-and-shift tooling. It replicates source VMs from VMware, Hyper-V, AWS EC2, or Azure to Google Compute Engine using an incremental block-level replication agent. The migration tooling itself is free. Downstream costs are the target Compute Engine instance from cutover, the persistent disks used for replication state, and any source-side egress.
Migration Center sits at the top of the migration toolchain and provides discovery, assessment, and a migration tracker similar to AWS Migration Hub or Azure Migrate. The assessment outputs include right-sizing recommendations using Custom Machine Types, total cost of ownership projections, and dependency mapping. Migration Center is free for the discovery and assessment phases; the migration tooling components have their own pricing models documented in the Migration Center pricing page.
BigQuery is the strongest single-product cost wedge in the GCP migration story. For customers migrating from on-premise data warehouses, the cost comparison is rarely close. Teradata, Oracle Exadata, Netezza, and Vertica all charge for storage and compute as a combined node-hour. BigQuery separates storage at $0.02 per GB per month (active) or $0.01 per GB per month (long-term, untouched for 90 days) from query compute, which is charged either on-demand at $6.25 per TB scanned or via flat-rate slot reservations starting at roughly $1,700 per month for 100 slots.
A typical 50 TB Teradata estate moving to BigQuery on flat-rate slots and active storage spends roughly $4,000 to $7,000 per month at steady state, compared with a typical $40,000 to $70,000 per month all-in Teradata bill. The migration itself, schema conversion via BigQuery Migration Service, ETL rewrite via Cloud Data Fusion or Dataform, and downstream BI tool reconnection, typically costs $150K to $600K depending on the complexity of the existing SQL dialect and the ETL pipeline count. The pay-back period at this scale is almost always under 18 months and frequently under 12.
GCP egress pricing is broadly comparable to AWS and Azure, with one structural advantage. The first 1 GB per month per region egress to internet is free, and the per-GB rate steps down at the 10 TB and 150 TB thresholds. For migration data movement the relevant tool is Transfer Appliance, the GCP equivalent of AWS Snowball, available in 100 TB and 480 TB variants. Transfer Appliance pricing sits in the same band as AWS Snowball, with the ingest into Cloud Storage being free and the device rental being the headline cost.
Many GCP migrations also use the Storage Transfer Service for online transfer from AWS S3, Azure Blob, or HTTPS endpoints. Storage Transfer Service has no per-GB charge for the transfer itself; customers only pay source egress and target storage. For datasets under 50 TB across a fibre link, Storage Transfer Service is often simpler and cheaper than Transfer Appliance.
A representative cost build for a 100-server mid-market migration to GCP with a 12-month programme, mixed strategy (60 percent rehost, 30 percent replatform to Cloud SQL and GKE, 10 percent retire), 20 TB of data, one Transfer Appliance for bulk seed, and sustained-use discounts applied throughout.
Worked GCP migration cost build, 100 servers, 20 TB, 12 months
| Cost line | Low estimate | Typical estimate | High estimate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Assessment and planning (Migration Center + partner) | $35,000 | $65,000 | $120,000 |
| Migration labour, 90 workloads, blended | $580,000 | $1,120,000 | $2,050,000 |
| Tooling (M4VMs, Database Migration Service) | $18,000 | $45,000 | $95,000 |
| Transfer Appliance (1 device, 30 days total) | $5,000 | $10,000 | $18,000 |
| Cloud Interconnect or VPN, 12 months | $8,000 | $24,000 | $50,000 |
| Parallel running (5 months, blended, SUD applied) | $280,000 | $610,000 | $1,050,000 |
| Cutover and downtime contingency | $45,000 | $100,000 | $300,000 |
| Premium Support (12 months) | $100,000 | $155,000 | $210,000 |
| Staff retraining (8 engineers) | $20,000 | $40,000 | $72,000 |
| Security rework (IAM, VPC, encryption, CSCC) | $40,000 | $100,000 | $240,000 |
| Contingency at 15 percent | $170,000 | $340,000 | $640,000 |
| RaMP / partner funding credit | ($200,000) | ($340,000) | ($580,000) |
| Net total estimate | $1,099,000 | $2,259,000 | $4,265,000 |
The typical-column number, $2.26M, is roughly 17 percent below the AWS equivalent in the worked AWS scenario on the sister page. The gap is driven primarily by sustained-use discount on parallel-run compute and by slightly lower premium support cost. For data-heavy workloads moving to BigQuery, the gap widens materially because the BigQuery destination cost is so much lower than the equivalent Redshift or Azure Synapse destination cost. For Microsoft-heavy workloads the gap narrows or inverts back toward Azure because Hybrid Benefit does not apply on GCP.
GCP migration cost is the quietest of the three big-cloud migration stories. There is less marketing noise, smaller credit programmes, and fewer headline benefits. Yet for the right workload shape, data-heavy production estates with high steady-state utilisation, GCP consistently lands as the cheapest destination on the 3-year horizon. The discipline that makes the saving real is the same as for AWS and Azure: retire what you can, right-size before reserving, compress the cutover window, and structure partner funding early.
A. Mid-market scope (100 servers, 20 TB, 12 month timeline) typically lands at $1.3M to $2.5M all-in. GCP tends to come in 5 to 12 percent cheaper than AWS on compute thanks to automatic sustained-use discounts and Custom Machine Types. The gap narrows on managed services where GCP and AWS pricing converges.
A. Sustained-use discounts apply automatically to Compute Engine instances that run for a significant portion of the billing month. Discounts step up across the month: 0 percent for the first 25 percent of use, 20 percent for the second quarter, 40 percent for the third, and 60 percent for the final quarter. A workload running 24x7 for the full month earns an effective 30 percent discount on the on-demand compute rate without any commitment or contract.
A. Migrate to Virtual Machines (the successor to Velostrata) is included in Google Cloud Migration Center at no additional charge for the migration tooling itself. The downstream costs are the target Compute Engine instance, persistent disks for replication, and network egress on the source side. Most teams report total tooling spend in the low thousands for a 100-server migration.
A. BigQuery is one of the strongest cost wedges in GCP's portfolio for data warehousing. Customers migrating from Teradata, Oracle Exadata, or Netezza frequently see 60 to 80 percent reductions in steady-state compute cost when moving to BigQuery, primarily because BigQuery decouples storage from compute and only charges per query. The migration itself, schema conversion, ETL rewrite, and downstream BI tool reconnection, typically costs $150K to $600K for a mid-size warehouse but the run-rate saving usually pays back within 18 months.
A. Yes. Google Cloud Rapid Migration Program (RaMP) and Google Cloud Partner Advantage Migrate Funding provide credits to qualifying enterprise migrations through Google Cloud Premier Partners, typically covering 20 to 35 percent of migration cost. The credits are tied to committed GCP consumption over a 3-year term and require the partner to register the deal before contract signing. The structure is similar to AWS MAP and Azure AMMP but at slightly lower headline percentages.
A. Small migrations of 5 to 20 servers complete in 2 to 5 months. Mid-market migrations of 50 to 200 servers run 6 to 14 months. Enterprise migrations of 500 servers or more run 18 to 30 months. GCP migrations frequently complete faster for data-heavy workloads thanks to the BigQuery and Vertex AI managed services reducing the assembly required on the destination side, but slower for Microsoft-heavy estates where the licensing and tooling alignment favours Azure.
GCP migration cost calculator ->
Sustained-use, Cloud Migrate, BigQuery
On-prem to AWS ->
MAP credits, EC2, Snowball
On-prem to Azure ->
Hybrid Benefit, FastTrack
AWS to Azure ->
Cross-cloud, egress, IAM
Azure to AWS ->
Losing Hybrid Benefit, AD federation
Data centre exit ->
Decommission, wave, real-estate
Oracle to AWS ->
RDS for Oracle, Aurora PostgreSQL
SAP HANA to cloud ->
RISE pricing, 18-month reality
10 hidden costs ->
Detailed playbook
Updated 2 May 2026