ShareGate vs AvePoint vs Quest for Microsoft 365 migration
Flat annual, per-user and quote-only pricing side by side, with worked examples for a 250-user project and the questions that decide it.
ShareGate, AvePoint Fly and Quest On Demand Migration are the three names that appear on most shortlists for a SharePoint or tenant to tenant migration, and they price in three different ways. ShareGate publishes flat annual tiers. Quest prices per migrated user account for a single project, with public figures only on the UK G-Cloud framework. AvePoint prices per user and does not publish at all. Comparing them properly means comparing models, not headline numbers.
This article puts the verified figures side by side, works the maths for a typical 250-user project, and lists the questions that decide which model fits. Where a price is not public, it says so rather than guessing.
Three pricing models
| Vendor | Unit | Published figures | Source and date |
|---|---|---|---|
| ShareGate Migrate | Flat per year, per machine activation, one client organisation per subscription | Essentials US$5,995 (1 machine, 1 migration at a time); Pro US$9,995 (5 machines, 5 concurrent, adds Exchange, Google Workspace, Entra ID, Purview labels); Enterprise US$17,995 (25 machines) | sharegate.com/pricing, September 2026 |
| Quest On Demand Migration | Per migrated user account, one migration project | UK G-Cloud 14 list, April 2024: Suite T1 £16.91, T3 £22.55, T5 £35.76 per migrated user. The licence “may only be used for one migration project” | Digital Marketplace pricing document, April 2024 |
| AvePoint Fly | Per user. Fly Server is “one universal per-user price regardless of the source” with “zero data caps”; the SaaS edition is per user or per data | Not published, quote only | AvePoint Fly Server SKU brochure and avepoint.com/pricing, September 2026 |
Two secondary players are worth keeping in view because they anchor the per-user end of the market. BitTitan MigrationWiz publishes per-object prices: a mailbox at US$14, a User Migration Bundle at US$17.50 including Teams private chat, Shared Documents at US$25 per library up to 50 GB, Teams Collaboration at US$48 per team up to 100 GB, and a Tenant Migration Bundle at US$57 per user. Cloudiway is about US$11 standard or US$17 premium per user according to secondary sources in 2026, single use with a 90-day delta window.
ShareShift sits with ShareGate in the flat model but changes the unit: per registered worker rather than per machine activation, with unlimited data, unlimited concurrent jobs per worker and no workload gating. Annual is US$2,995 or £2,395 a year with three workers; the MSP plan is US$7,995 or £6,395 with ten client slots. The ShareGate pricing article has the full ShareGate breakdown.
A 250-user tenant to tenant project, priced three ways
Take a 250-user organisation being absorbed into another tenant: OneDrive for everyone, a few dozen SharePoint sites, Teams with channel history, Planner plans. Mailboxes may or may not be in scope, and that single decision moves the answer more than anything else.
| Option | Content only | With mailboxes | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| ShareGate | US$5,995 (Essentials) | US$9,995 (Pro) | One machine and one job at a time on Essentials; five on Pro. Cannot pause or resume. Teams conversations to an HTML tab. Private chats disabled since 5 May 2026. |
| Quest On Demand Migration | About £4,228 at T1 to £8,940 at T5 | Included in the suite tiers | Per migrated user, one project. Figures from the UK public sector list; commercial prices outside that framework are not published. |
| AvePoint Fly | Quote | Quote | Per user with no data cap. Ask for the per-user figure in writing and whether re-runs after cutover are included. |
| BitTitan MigrationWiz | About US$14,250 (Tenant Migration Bundle at US$57 per user) | Included in the bundle | Consumption pricing; document libraries and Teams also purchasable per object. |
| Cloudiway | About US$2,750 to US$4,250 | Depends on edition | Secondary-source prices; 90-day delta window; single use. |
| ShareShift | US$2,995 (Annual) or US$499 per month | Not offered; use Microsoft's Migration Orchestrator or a mailbox specialist alongside | Three workers, unlimited concurrent jobs, pause and resume, Teams posts imported with original authors and timestamps. |
The pattern is clear. Below roughly 100 users the per-user vendors can be cheaper than any flat plan. Above that, flat pricing wins, and the gap widens with every extra user because the flat price does not move. For a 1,000-user project the per-user models are several multiples of the flat plans.
Capability fit, not just price
Pricing model settles a lot, but each vendor has a distinct centre of gravity, and buying the cheapest tool that does not cover a workload is the most expensive mistake available.
- ShareGate is broadest on SharePoint sources: SharePoint 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019 and Subscription Edition, SharePoint Online, OneDrive, file shares, Google Drive, and Box through PowerShell on Pro and Enterprise. It has a full PowerShell module with
Copy-Content,Import-Documentand-WhatIfpre-checks. Its 2026 releases added identity copy, mailbox folders and sensitivity label mapping on the higher tiers. Weaknesses are the ones its own help centre documents: no pause or resume, Teams conversations as HTML, private chats disabled, shared channels unsupported. - Quest On Demand Migration is a SaaS suite positioned around whole-tenant moves including identity, and its licence is per migrated user for one project. That suits a single M&A event where the user count is known and identity migration is in scope. It is a poor fit for restructuring within a tenant, where there is no per-user event to license, or for consultancies that run many small projects.
- AvePoint Fly is per user with no data cap, available as a server product and as SaaS. Quote-only pricing means procurement takes longer, and you should ask specifically about SharePoint Online to SharePoint Online restructuring, Teams channel history fidelity and re-run terms, because those are the areas where per-user tools differ most.
- Identity and mail are the workloads to isolate. ShareGate Pro, Quest and BitTitan cover mailboxes; ShareShift deliberately does not at launch. Microsoft's own Migration Orchestrator, in public preview since December 2025, moves mailboxes, OneDrive, Teams chats and meetings between tenants with the per-user Cross-tenant User Data Migration licence, but does not migrate SharePoint sites or Teams channels. Pairing Orchestrator for mail with a content tool for SharePoint and channels is a legitimate design.
For Teams, ask every vendor one precise question: are channel posts imported as native messages with original timestamps and authors through Microsoft's migration mode API, or written to an archive? And for chats, ask how they handle the history visibility problem that led ShareGate to disable private chat copying. The Teams migration tool guide explains what the API allows, so you can judge the answers.
Where your content travels
The three vendors also differ in where content flows during a migration. ShareGate is a desktop application: content passes through the workstation running it, which keeps it inside your network but ties throughput and licensing to that machine. Quest On Demand is SaaS, so content transits Quest's cloud. AvePoint offers both a server product and SaaS.
The distinction matters for two reasons. A SaaS path makes the vendor a processor of your content, which your data protection review has to cover with a DPA and a sub-processor list. And a desktop tool cannot resume a job on another machine or run more parallel work than the workstation allows. A worker-based hybrid, where the vendor's cloud holds licensing and aggregate counts only and customer-run workers push content straight to Microsoft's migration containers, avoids both problems; that is the model Microsoft's own Migration Manager uses and the one ShareShift is built on. Microsoft also notes that certificate-authenticated, app-only migration traffic is throttled less than user-mode traffic, which any of these tools should be using; the throttling article explains why more machines do not buy more API budget.
How to decide
- Fewer than about 100 users, a single project, identity and mail in scope: price Quest, BitTitan and Cloudiway per user, and check whether Microsoft's free Migration Orchestrator plus SPMT covers enough of it.
- More than about 100 users, or any restructuring inside a tenant, or a consultancy with repeat projects: a flat plan. Then compare ShareGate Essentials at US$5,995 with ShareShift Annual at US$2,995, on the workloads you have.
- Google Workspace, Exchange, Entra ID copy or sensitivity label mapping today: ShareGate Pro at US$9,995, or Quest, or an AvePoint quote.
- Teams channel history that must look like real conversations, or a run that must survive interruptions: check the migration mode and resume answers before the price.
- Many client tenants: read the MSP licensing article; the one client per subscription rule changes the maths entirely.
Whichever way the decision goes, run a pilot on real content before signing. ShareShift's 30-day trial uses the same application as the paid plans, and the pricing page shows Monthly, Annual and MSP in your currency.
Frequently asked questions
Which is cheaper, ShareGate, AvePoint or Quest?
It depends on user count. Quest at £16.91 to £35.76 per migrated user (UK G-Cloud list) is cheaper than ShareGate Essentials at US$5,995 for small user counts, and dearer from a few hundred users upward. AvePoint does not publish prices. For 250 users on content only, ShareGate Essentials is US$5,995, Quest is roughly £4,228 to £8,940, and ShareShift Annual is US$2,995.
Does AvePoint Fly publish pricing?
No. AvePoint's brochure describes one universal per-user price regardless of the source with zero data caps, and its SaaS edition is per user or per data, but the figures are quote only.
Can Quest On Demand Migration be reused for a second project?
The UK G-Cloud pricing document states the licence may only be used for one migration project. Confirm the terms for your own contract before relying on a second pass.
Which tool migrates Teams private chats?
No supported Microsoft Graph API can re-create 1:1 or group chats with original authors and timestamps. ShareGate disabled its private chat copy on 5 May 2026 because of history visibility defects. Microsoft's Migration Orchestrator moves 1:1 and group chats with a per-user licence. ShareShift exports chats as HTML archives and can post them into private channels.
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