The 7 Rs: Turning Migration Strategy into an Engineering Backlog

The AWS 7 Rs — rehost, relocate, replatform, refactor, repurchase, retain, retire — are a classification system. They are not a plan.

A plan is a backlog: who does what, in what order, with which automation, against which evidence.

That is the gap Level Up's AWS migration assessment is built to close.

Disposition is a label. Work is a list.

Take a single workload from the example assessment: Warehouse Management, PostgreSQL 15, 380 GB, no unsupported extensions.

Disposition: Replatform
Target: ECS + Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL
Confidence: High

That label is useless until it becomes tasks:

Confirm extensions and parameter groups against RDS
Terraform the target VPC, security groups, and RDS instance
Ansible-render app config, secrets, and health checks
Run validation queries and cutover rehearsals
Retire the source host after the wave completes

The 7 Rs decision is one field in a record. The backlog is the product.

A compact mapping

R	Typical AWS move	Usually becomes
Rehost	EC2 / VM import	Landing zone + host cutover + validation
Relocate	VMware → AWS without replatform	Hypervisor move + network proof
Replatform	RDS, FSx, ECS, managed queues	Service swap + config + data move
Refactor	Redshift, containers, rewrite	Architecture work, not just landing
Repurchase	SaaS replacement	Contract, identity, and data exit
Retain	Stay for now	Explicit non-goals and review date
Retire	Turn it off	Dependency proof + decommission tasks

Retain and retire are first-class outcomes. An assessment that migrates everything is not being thorough. It is being incurious.

Encode the 7 Rs as data, not slides

workload: wms
disposition: replatform
confidence: high
evidence:
  - engine: postgresql
    version: "15"
    storage_gb: 380
    unsupported_extensions: []
target:
  compute: ecs
  data: rds-postgresql
tasks:
  - id: T-041
    kind: terraform
    title: Provision RDS PostgreSQL and parameter group
  - id: T-042
    kind: ansible
    title: Cut over WMS config, secrets, and health checks

Once dispositions are data, you can generate waves, cost ranges, and automation candidates from the same file. You can also regenerate the executive report without inventing a second source of truth.

Strategy still needs a human

Rules can recommend replatform from version and extension evidence. They cannot decide that plant-floor MES must stay within 12 ms of OT equipment, or that Oracle license mobility blocks RDS.

Those exceptions are the job. The 7 Rs label is just the starting point.

If you want the full chain — evidence, disposition, waves, and backlog — start with the assessment page or request an assessment.