Report

2026 State of the Database Landscape

The Cloud Migration Divide

Cloud adoption is accelerating, but database migrations aren’t keeping pace.

The Cloud Migration Divide explores why complex, business-critical databases remain on-premises—and what’s holding organizations back as estates grow, risks increase, and confidence fails to scale with complexity.

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Factors contributing to the cloud migration divide in 2026

Stalled migrations increase reliance on hybrid environments

We didn’t want to manage multiple different data stacks on multiple clouds. That would increase both cloud operating overheads and make it harder to maintain expertise.

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Chris Chen

CTO, Goodhabitz

Highly capable teams are not immune to the consequences of heightened risk

Effective recommendations at every stage of the cloud migration are critical to building team confidence. Decisions come faster when teams know mistakes will highlight a fixable process - not point fingers at them.

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John Q Martin

Technology Partner & Alliances Manager, Redgate

Misaligned ownership creates decision friction

Lack of ownership can slow a cloud migration. Make sure all teams in the organization are clear on ownership, then the migration can move quickly and successfully.

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Pat Wright

Postgres Advocate, Redgate

Cloud platforms inherit legacy operating habits

The cloud is powerful, but it won’t fix bad habits. When organizations migrate legacy databases without re-evaluating their operational practices, the cloud simply preserves those habits at scale. Modern infrastructure still requires modern thinking.

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Grant Fritchey

Advocate, Redgate

Strategic intent appears to outpace operational confidence

There was no early warning. Something would spike, and then the work would start backwards to find where the problem actually was.

Ryan Pearse

Senior System Administrator, golfbox

AI is accelerating DevOps and elevating risk awareness

AI-driven improvements in DevOps are already helping database professionals boost reliability, speed, and visibility across complex environments. And when you can manage risk proactively with real-time insight and automation, you’re in a far stronger position to take on large transformation projects — such as a cloud migration — with confidence.

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Jeff Foster

Director of Technology & Innovation, Redgate

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