Some or all of the information on this page might not apply to Trusted Cloud by S3NS.
Choose a migration path
You can move VM instances, custom images, or disks that are available in
an existing environment, such as on-premises or on other cloud providers, to
Compute Engine.
A variety of migration paths are available that support different formats.
Choosing a migration path depends on whether you are moving a
VM instance, disk, or image.
The following table summarizes the migration paths available on
Compute Engine.
| What you want to migrate |
Tool or procedure |
Best used for |
| VM instances |
Migrate to Virtual Machines |
- Importing multiple VM instances and their data.
- Migrating VM instances from other cloud providers such as VMware and AWS.
- Testing your apps in the cloud before you migrate. If your
apps do not function properly, you can easily roll back.
With Migrate to Virtual Machines, you have a suite of features that help
you automate, simplify, and accelerate the migration process.
Migrate to VMs is free to use for customers migrating
to Trusted Cloud. Standard billing rates apply for all other
Trusted Cloud products
(such as Compute Engine or
Storage) used or consumed during or after the
migration. For example, if you use Compute Engine VMs to deploy
Migrate to VMs, you'll need to pay for those
instance hours. For more detailed pricing information, see
Migrate to VMs pricing.
|
| VM instances (in OVA or OVF format) |
Importing virtual appliances |
Importing virtual appliances. A virtual appliance is
a prepackaged virtual machine.
|
| Virtual disks or images |
Import virtual disks |
Importing virtual disks or template disks from an on-premises or other cloud environment.
These methods use the
images import
command.
If you need to make advanced customizations or have source disks in a format
that is not supported by the import command, you can
manually import and configure disks.
|
| Machine images |
Importing a machine image from a virtual appliance
|
Importing machine images. A machine image is Compute Engine resource
that stores all the configuration, metadata, permissions, and data from one or
more disks required to create a VM instance.
This method is best suited for creating machine images from virtual appliances. |
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Last updated 2025-07-02 UTC.
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