You're viewing the current version of Migration Assistant documentation (Kubernetes/EKS-based). For the classic ECS/CDK-based version, see the classic documentation.

Migration Assistant for OpenSearch

Migration Assistant is the Kubernetes-native migration platform for moving data, metadata, and live traffic from Elasticsearch, OpenSearch, and Apache Solr to OpenSearch.

The Migration Assistant operating model is:

• You define the migration in workflow configuration.
• Migration Assistant runs the work on Kubernetes.
• You use the Migration Console and Workflow CLI to submit, observe, approve, validate, and switch traffic to the target.

Migration Assistant runs on any Kubernetes distribution, but Amazon EKS is the recommended production path on AWS because it supplies the AWS identity, image, snapshot, and observability integrations that you typically need for a real migration.

If you used the older ECS/CDK-based Migration Assistant, see Changes from the classic version.

Key capabilities

Migration Assistant provides the following:

• One migration model for snapshot-based migrations with planned downtime (called backfill-only) and zero-downtime migrations that use live-traffic Capture and Replay.
• Repeatable workflows instead of ad-hoc infrastructure choreography.
• Low source-cluster impact through snapshot-based backfill with Reindex-from-Snapshot (RFS).
• Operational checkpoints through approval gates, logs, status views, and validation steps.
• A practical AWS path on EKS that reduces surrounding platform work.

Getting started

1. Decide whether Migration Assistant is the right tool.
2. Understand why the product moved to Kubernetes and why EKS is recommended on AWS.
3. Assess your migration. Review breaking changes, downtime constraints, and required transformations.
4. Choose your deployment path.
5. Learn how a migration runs.
6. Use the Workflow CLI and then pick a playbook.

Looking for the older ECS deployment model? See the classic Migration Assistant documentation.

Changes from the classic version

If you previously used the ECS/CDK-based Migration Assistant, the operating model is different in this version:

• The migration is defined in workflow configuration instead of long-lived infrastructure stacks.
• Migration Assistant runs the work on Kubernetes (Amazon EKS is the recommended AWS path).
• Day-to-day operations happen through the Migration Console and Workflow CLI rather than through ad-hoc scripts.

For background on the rationale, see Why Kubernetes and EKS.