Cloud Migration Cost in India 2026 — AWS vs Azure Pricing

Cloud migration cost in India in 2026 is misunderstood because vendors quote hyperscaler list prices without migration labor, data egress, or the refactor work your monolith actually needs. A 40-user SME running on-premise Windows Server might spend ₹25K–₹80K/month on AWS or Azure Mumbai/Pune regions after migration — but the one-time migration project often costs ₹8L–₹40L depending on application count, database complexity, and compliance requirements. This guide compares AWS vs Azure for Indian deployments, breaks down lift-and-shift vs re-platform vs refactor economics, and lists hidden costs finance teams miss until month three.

Cloud migration project cost ranges (India 2026)

Assessment and discovery (2–3 weeks): ₹1.5L–₹4L — application inventory, dependency mapping, TCO model, and migration wave plan. Lift-and-shift of 2–5 VMs with minor networking changes: ₹6L–₹15L including testing and cutover weekend support. Re-platform (managed databases, containerization of 3–8 services): ₹15L–₹35L. Refactor to cloud-native microservices with CI/CD and observability: ₹30L–₹80L+ over 4–9 months.

Databases drive cost — SQL Server licenses on Azure Hybrid Benefit vs RDS on AWS, PostgreSQL managed services, and DMS-style migration tooling. ERP and custom .NET/Java monoliths with hard-coded IPs need more refactor than static marketing sites.

Budget 15–20% contingency for unknown dependencies — Indian SMEs often discover cron jobs on forgotten VMs, USB license dongles, or Tally integrations on static IPs during discovery.

AWS vs Azure monthly run costs — Mumbai/Pune regions

For a typical SME footprint — 2 app servers, 1 managed database, load balancer, 500GB storage, daily backups, modest egress — expect ₹35K–₹1.2L/month on either AWS or Azure with reserved instances or savings plans. Azure often wins for organizations already on Microsoft 365 and Active Directory federation; AWS wins for broader SaaS integration catalogs and mature India region service breadth.

Compute: 2× general-purpose instances (4 vCPU, 16GB) reserved 1-year — roughly ₹18K–₹35K/month combined. Managed PostgreSQL or SQL — ₹12K–₹45K/month by size and HA. Storage and snapshots — ₹3K–₹15K. Load balancer, NAT gateway, and data transfer — ₹5K–₹25K; egress to internet is the silent killer for media-heavy apps.

Use the AWS and Azure pricing calculators with India region selected — then add 30% for production HA, monitoring, and WAF unless you explicitly scope dev-only.

• Small SME footprint: ₹35K–₹80K/month reserved
• Mid ERP / multi-service: ₹80K–₹2.5L/month
• Egress-heavy apps: add ₹10K–₹1L+/month
• Dev/test sandboxes: ₹8K–₹25K/month if shut down nights

Lift-and-shift vs refactor — cost and risk tradeoffs

Lift-and-shift is fastest and cheapest upfront — move VMs as-is. You inherit technical debt, oversized instances, and license costs. Good for deadline-driven exits from failing hardware or colo contracts. Re-platform moves databases to managed services and apps to containers — moderate cost, better ops. Refactor is highest cost but unlocks auto-scaling, lower long-term run cost, and faster feature velocity.

Indian manufacturers often lift-and-shift first to meet a colo renewal, then refactor integration layers toward ERP APIs in phase 2. Fintech and healthcare frequently require refactor from day one for encryption, VPC segmentation, and audit logging.

Hidden cloud migration costs Indian CFOs miss

Data egress when syncing to on-premise BI or third-party tools. Microsoft SQL licenses if not using hybrid benefit. Static IP and NAT gateway hours. Premium support plans. SSL certificates and WAF rules. Backup retention beyond 7 days. Developer environments left running 24/7. Migration tooling licenses (one-time). Training for ops team on IAM, CloudWatch/Azure Monitor, and incident response.

Compliance: VAPT after migration, logging retention for RBI/SEBI clients, and KMS key management — each adds ₹1L–₹5L in year one.

AWS vs Azure — decision matrix for Indian businesses

Choose Azure when: heavy Microsoft stack (.NET, AD, Dynamics), M365 E5 security features, hybrid benefit for Windows/SQL licenses, and enterprise EA discounts already negotiated. Choose AWS when: broader managed service catalog, stronger India startup credits history, Lambda/serverless-first architecture, or multi-cloud strategy with GCP analytics.

Both offer Mumbai region; verify specific services (certain GPU SKUs, Private Link patterns) you need are available. For most SME ERP and web apps, either works — migration partner quality matters more than religious cloud preference.

• Azure edge: M365/AD integration, Hybrid Benefit, .NET workloads
• AWS edge: service breadth, serverless maturity, partner ecosystem
• Tie-breaker: existing team skills and negotiated enterprise discounts

Migration timeline and cutover planning

Wave 0: non-prod and dev — weeks 1–4. Wave 1: internal tools and marketing sites — weeks 5–8. Wave 2: core ERP APIs and databases — weeks 9–16 with rollback plan. Cutover weekends need named engineers, runbooks, and DNS TTL lowered 48 hours prior.

Parallel run (dual-write or read replica lag monitoring) adds cost but reduces risk for 24×7 operations — common for logistics and fintech.

5-year TCO comparison — cloud vs on-premise

On-premise: CapEx on servers every 4–5 years, UPS, cooling, rack space, Windows licenses, IT headcount for patching. Cloud: OpEx, elasticity, disaster recovery included — but discipline required to right-size and kill zombie resources.

Break-even varies: cloud often wins on DR and ops labor for SMEs without dedicated infra teams; on-premise can win at steady high utilization with owned hardware — rare without mature capacity planning.