You have an on-premises Microsoft SQL Server instance named SQL1 that hosts five databases.
You need to migrate the databases to an Azure SQL managed instance. The solution must:
What should you use?
Log shipping (and its Azure-native implementation, the Log Replay Service) continuously copies and restores full, differential, and transaction log backups from the on-premises SQL Server to the target Azure SQL Managed Instance. Because the databases stay in a restoring state and are kept current via ongoing log backups, the final cutover only requires restoring the last (tail-log) backup, which minimizes the downtime window and ensures no committed transactions are lost. Backup and Restore requires a single offline backup/restore operation that causes extended downtime and risks losing transactions committed after the backup is taken; Data Migration Assistant only assesses compatibility and migrates schema, not live data with minimal downtime; and Always On availability groups are not a supported direct migration mechanism from on-premises SQL Server to Azure SQL Managed Instance in this generic form.
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