Migrating & Adopting the Cloud
The Cloud Adoption Framework, the 7 Rs migration strategies, and the AWS services that physically move data.
AWS Cloud Adoption Framework (CAF)
The AWS CAF organizes guidance for moving an *organization* (not just servers) to the cloud into six perspectives. Three are business-focused and three are technical — a split the exam tests directly.
| Group | Perspectives | Focus |
|---|---|---|
| Business capabilities | Business, People, Governance | Strategy and value, culture and skills, risk and portfolio management |
| Technical capabilities | Platform, Security, Operations | Architecture and infrastructure, protection and compliance, running workloads day to day |
The 7 Rs of migration
| Strategy | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Rehost ("lift and shift") | Move as-is to cloud VMs — fastest, no code changes | Copy a web app from on-prem VMware to EC2 |
| Replatform ("lift, tinker, and shift") | Small optimizations during the move | Move a self-managed MySQL server to Amazon RDS |
| Repurchase | Switch to a different (usually SaaS) product | Replace a self-hosted CRM with Salesforce |
| Refactor / Re-architect | Redesign the app to be cloud-native — biggest effort, biggest payoff | Break a monolith into serverless microservices |
| Retire | Turn off things nobody needs anymore | Decommission an unused reporting server |
| Retain | Keep on-premises for now | A mainframe app staying put until its contract ends |
| Relocate | Move at the hypervisor level without buying new hardware | VMware Cloud on AWS |
Rehost = no changes, fastest. Replatform = small managed-service upgrades (the RDS example is nearly always Replatform). Refactor = rewrite for cloud-native. Match those three confidently and you'll get most migration questions right.
Services that move data and servers
Single dashboard to track migration progress across tools.
Automates rehosting: continuously replicates on-prem servers into AWS.
Migrates databases to AWS with minimal downtime — including between different engines (e.g., Oracle → Aurora).
Fast online transfer of file data between on-prem storage and AWS (S3, EFS, FSx).
Physical devices shipped to you for offline transfer of large datasets (terabytes to petabytes) when the network would be too slow.
Managed SFTP/FTPS/FTP endpoints backed by S3 or EFS.
Rule of thumb the exam rewards: huge dataset + limited bandwidth + a deadline → Snow Family. Ongoing online sync of files → DataSync. Databases → DMS.
A company moves its self-managed PostgreSQL database to Amazon RDS during its migration, changing nothing else about the application. Which migration strategy is this?