How to Use Migration Manager in SharePoint to Move a File Share

Our marketing team wanted its brand files and campaign plans moved off an old Windows file share and into a SharePoint library before the server was retired. They also wanted one place in the admin center to watch the job, not a desktop tool running on somebody’s laptop.

In this tutorial, we’ll use Migration Manager in SharePoint end to end: install an agent, scan a file share, run it into a library on /sites/SPGuides, and check the reports.

Migration Manager lives in the SharePoint admin center and hands the work to agents on Windows machines. Every label and number below comes from our test run on 10/24/2026.

Here’s what we’re building: the Marketing Share folders, Brand Assets and Campaigns, sitting in the Migration Demo library with their original modified dates.

Before You Start

You need the SharePoint Administrator (or Global Administrator) role in Microsoft 365, plus a Windows account that can read every share you plan to move. For one PC and a few folders, the SharePoint Migration Tool (SPMT) may be simpler.

• Agent machine: Windows 10 client or Windows Server 2016 or later, .NET Framework 4.6.2 or later, 8 GB RAM minimum (16 GB recommended), and 150 GB free on an SSD.
• Source server: it must support SMB 2.0 or higher.
• Destination: the site and library should already exist. Ours is the Migration Demo library on /sites/SPGuides.

Here’s our sample share. It’s small on purpose, so the first run proves the setup.

Name	Type	Notes
Marketing Share	Root folder	Source path, 112.21 KB in total
Brand Assets	Folder	Brand Guidelines.docx
Campaigns	Folder	Fall Campaign Plan 2026.docx, Holiday Email Calendar.docx, Lead Report Q3 2026.xlsx

Step 1: Open Migration Manager in the SharePoint Admin Center

1. Open the SharePoint admin center and select Migration in the left navigation.
2. On the Migration Manager page, find the File shares tile (“Copy your on-premises file shares to Microsoft 365”).
3. Select Get started.

The File share migration page opens with two blocks: Download agent and Let’s scan your source, plus the Scans, Migrations, and Agents tabs.

Checkpoint: Add source path is grayed out. That’s expected: it stays disabled until at least one agent is connected.

Step 2: Install the Migration Agent

The agent is a Windows service that reads the share and uploads to Microsoft 365. Sign in to the agent machine with the Windows account that can read the share, then follow these steps (installer labels below are from Microsoft Learn).

1. Select Download agent and run clientsetup.exe. Learn also offers it under Agents > Add > Download agent setup file.
2. On the Welcome page, choose User Credential Authentication (or Certificate Authentication) and select Next.
3. Sign in with the SharePoint admin account for the destination tenant.
4. Enter the password of the Windows account that has Read access to all the shares, and select Install.
5. Optionally test agent access, then select Close.

The page then said “Congratulations! You have an agent configured and ready for your migration tasks” with a green Agent connected status. On the Agents tab, the agent shows as <computer>\<user>, in agent group Default.

Checkpoint: The agent row shows State Enabled. In our run it took a few minutes after setup before the row appeared, so refresh before you reinstall anything.

Step 3: Add the Source Path and Scan It

The scan flags problems before any file moves, so tidy the share first with our SharePoint folder structure best practices in mind.

1. On the Scans tab, select Add source path.
2. Keep Specify a single source path and enter the full UNC path. Ours was \\<computer>\C$\SPGuidesDemo\Marketing Share.
3. Clear Add all subfolders as source paths (it’s checked by default) if you want one task for the whole share.
4. Leave Automatically scan content checked and select Add.

The row first showed Completed with 0 B and 0 files. After a refresh about a minute later, it read Ready to migrate: 112.21 KB, 4 files, 3 folders, a max path length of 78, and 5 root permissions.

Checkpoint: Scan result Ready to migrate and a file count that matches the share. A Warning usually means invalid characters or folders the agent can’t read.

Step 4: Copy the Scan to a Migration and Pick the Destination

A clean scan becomes a migration task. If the target library doesn’t exist yet, create a document library in SharePoint Online first.

1. Select the scan row, then select Copy to migrations.
2. Under Add destination, choose SharePoint (OneDrive and Teams are the other options).
3. Enter the site URL. Ours ended in /sites/SPGuides. Next stays disabled until you click out of the box.
4. In the library dropdown (Documents is the default), choose Migration Demo.

Step 5: Configure the Settings and Run the Task

1. Enter a Task name. We used Marketing Share to SPGuides.
2. Keep Run now, or pick Run later and select Schedule.
3. Check Agent group assignment. Ours read Default (active agents: 1).
4. Review Preserve file share permissions and All settings, then select Run.

Only keep share permissions if the NTFS permissions are clean; otherwise set access fresh in SharePoint using our SharePoint permissions best practices.

Test the Migration

On the Migrations tab, our task sat at Waiting for agent for about three minutes, moved to 67% completed, and then showed Complete. It started at 10:50 PM and finished at 10:52 PM (admin center times are Pacific).

Select the task name to open its details. Ours reported 100% completed, 4 file(s) out of 4 migrated, and 114900 byte(s) out of 114900 migrated,.

In the Migration Demo library, both folders arrived with the source modified dates and System Account in Modified By. Select Download task report for the item-level CSVs; it’s enabled only once a task is Complete or Failed.

Checkpoint: File count in the library matches the scan (4 files, 2 folders). The source share is untouched, because Migration Manager copies rather than moves.

Make It Production-Ready

• Use a service account. Install agents with a dedicated account that has Read on the shares and SharePoint admin access.
• Size the agent pool. Time 20-30 test tasks on one agent, then add only the agents you need; extra agents add throttling.
• Group agents. Agent groups separate regions or priorities. Each agent belongs to one group, and scans run only on agents in Default.
• Plan incremental runs. Rerun tasks with Delta sync (new or changed since last run) or Full incremental (compare everything) before cutover. Our SharePoint migration checklist covers the full timeline.
• Save the reports. Migration Manager reports expire after 90 days, so download them for your audit trail.

Troubleshooting

• Add source path is disabled: no agent is connected yet. Install one and wait for Agent connected.
• Agent missing after setup: wait a few minutes and refresh the Agents tab, as we had to.
• Scan shows 0 files: refresh. Ours updated from 0 B to 112.21 KB about a minute later.
• Task stuck in Queued or waiting: make sure an agent is Enabled, not In use or Disconnected. Each agent queues up to 10 tasks.
• Agent Disconnected: fix the network first. If the admin account’s password changed, reinstall the agent.

For the planning errors that hurt every migration tool, see our list of SharePoint migration mistakes to avoid.

Where to Take It Next

• Moving many shares at once? Our guide to migrating file shares to SharePoint in bulk shows the CSV approach.
• Rebuild navigation and views on the new library with our SharePoint tutorials.

A few more guides worth bookmarking before cutover:

• 15 SharePoint Document Library Best Practices for Efficient File Management
• When to Use OneDrive vs SharePoint for File Storage
• Microsoft Teams vs SharePoint: Which One Should You Use (and When)?
• How to Get SharePoint Document Library Size Using PnP PowerShell (3 Easy Methods)

Frequently Asked Questions