15 Cloud Migration Statistics and Trends for 2024

As the world of work continues to evolve and the technological needs of companies change, cloud migration has seen some interesting developments in recent years.

At Auvik, we’ve collected three key takeaways and 15 cloud migration statistics that point to emerging trends and help IT professionals better position themselves for the future.

First, some quick definitions: Public clouds are managed by providers, while private clouds are managed by the company or a third party. Hybrid cloud solutions offer the best of both worlds, blending these two strategies to offer organizations more flexibility and greater control over data management.

For example, an enterprise using a hybrid cloud strategy can store private personal information and other sensitive data in a private cloud, while using public cloud services for less sensitive operations such as running apps.

Now that we’ve covered the basics, let’s dive in.

1. Cloud migration has slowed, but is still going strong (source)

Among technology decision-makers surveyed in 2023, 57% reported accelerating their cloud migration over the course of the previous year. However, in a similar survey conducted by the same organization the previous year, 69% of respondents responded the same way.

This is likely a natural correction following the explosion in cloud migration in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The survey found that it’s become standard for organizations across industries to adopt cloud-based strategies when upgrading their technology or purchasing new solutions.

2. More than half of IT environments are in the cloud (source)

A survey of IT decision-makers across organizations averaging 13,000 employees revealed that 52% of companies have migrated a majority of their IT environments to the cloud. This includes infrastructure, applications, data analytics, and more.

Further, 63% of respondents project that cloud environments will house the majority of their IT processes in the next 18 months.

3. Multiple public clouds are the fastest growing cloud strategy among enterprises, while hybrid clouds remain the most popular (source)

While merging public and private clouds in a hybrid cloud deployment is still the most popular cloud solution, a fast-growing percentage of enterprises are using multiple public clouds.

A global survey of cloud decision-makers and users revealed that from 2022 to 2024, the percentage of enterprises implementing a multiple public cloud strategy increased from 7% to 14%. This follows 11% adoption in 2021, before the emergence of multiple private and single private in survey results.

In 2022, 2% of survey respondents reported using a multiple private cloud deployment, and that percentage has remained stable ever since. At the same time, single private cloud deployment was first reported by survey respondents in 2022, emerging at 2% and declining to 1% between 2023 and 2024.

Meanwhile, single public cloud deployment has generally remained the third-most popular cloud strategy, peaking at 11% in 2023 before decreasing to 10% in 2024.

By far, the most popular cloud strategy for enterprises is still a hybrid cloud strategy, adopted by 73% of enterprises. However, this percentage has decreased from 84% in 2021.

Important Cloud Migration Statistics

Here are 10 cloud migration statistics IT professionals need to know.

1. Up to 32% of cloud spend is wasted (source)

According to a Forbes Business Council article, nearly one third of the money that organizations spend on cloud infrastructure is lost through poor management and bad investments.

2. 98% of U.S. organizations have adopted the cloud for at least some business operations (source)

Even if it’s only using Dropbox for cloud storage, nearly 100% of American companies use cloud services. This is an increase from 91% in 2020.

According to research by Foundry, the following needs are driving cloud adoption:

• Disaster recovery and business continuity
• Replacing legacy technology
• Reduced costs
• Improved productivity
• Flexibility in responding to changes in the market

3. End-user spending is projected to increase in 2024 for all cloud computing segments (source)

Here is the projected 2024 spending for each segment, including the percentage of increase from the previous year.

• Platform as a service (PaaS): $176.5 billion (21.5% increase)
• Software as a service (SaaS): $244 billion (18.9% increase)
• Desktop as a service (DaaS): $3.1 billion (10.7% increase)
• Business process as a service (BPaaS): $72.9 billion (10% increase)

4. Cloud capabilities helped 60% of survey respondents improve or sustain revenue in the previous year (source) 

This is according to a 2022 survey of IT decision-makers.

5. The public cloud market passed $561 billion in 2023 and is projected to reach $825 billion by 2025, at a CAGR of 21.3% (source)

This is an increase from $456.5 billion in 2022 and $384.3 billion in 2021.

Forecasts indicate the cloud computing market size will continue to grow, increasing 2.5% in 2024 to reach a total of $675.4 billion.

Here’s the dollar amount that different cloud-based services are expected to reach by the end of 2024:

• Cloud application services (SaaS): $247.2 billion
• Cloud system infrastructure services (IaaS): $180 billion
• Cloud application infrastructure (PaaS): $172.4 billion
• Cloud business process services (BPaaS): $76.7 billion
• Desktop as a Service (DaaS): $3 billion

6. Value of global cloud resources could reach $3 trillion by 2030 (source)

According to projections from McKinsey, companies that “go beyond” adoption of the cloud could enjoy a share of this massive EBITDA value.

To reach this dollar amount, McKinsey assessed revenue growth potential for companies that leverage cost efficiencies, revenue increases, cost savings, and investments in emerging technologies that the cloud would make possible.

7. Over the next year, more than one-third of enterprises intend to be in the evaluation/research stage of multi-cloud deployment (source)

Here’s the full breakdown of survey responses:

• Evaluating/researching: 36%
• Deployment in progress: 24%
• Full deployment: 13%
• No plans for a multi-cloud strategy: 27%

8. Organizations are investing 31% of their IT budget in cloud computing (source)

Further, approximately 66% of IT decision-makers expect that percentage to increase over the next year.

9. Amazon Web Services (AWS) controls 31% of the cloud infrastructure services market, making it the leading provider (source)

In second and third place are Microsoft Azure with 25% Google Cloud with 10%. Combined, all three providers control 66% of the market share.

10. Among enterprises, an average of 72% of cloud spending decisions are controlled by IT (source)

Conversely, approximately 28% of enterprises reported that cloud spending is primarily controlled by other lines of business.

11. By 2027, 70% of large companies will use cloud platforms to speed up business initiatives (source)

This would be a more than 55% increase from 2023, when less than 15% of enterprises were using cloud platforms for this purpose. Gartner projects this growth will be driven by the adoption of generative AI.

12. Nearly 60% of companies store or process sensitive banking information in the cloud (source)

An even higher percentage of organizations plan to do so in the future, with only 25% of survey respondents reporting no intentions of using the cloud to store or process banking information. This highlights the necessity for robust cloud security measures such as cloud penetration testing to protect sensitive information from data breaches.

13. To advance their cloud strategy, cost management capabilities are the most important thing enterprises need from vendors, at 37% (source)

Here are the other top cloud computing needs among enterprises:

• Security expertise: 34%
• Improved capabilities for cloud management: 28%
• Guidance on strategy: 26%
• Training and support: 25%
• Licensing or bulk discount offerings: 25%
• Improved governance tools: 23%
• Access to emerging functionalities like AI and machine learning: 21%
• Services specific to their industry: 19%
• Commitment to standards: 17%

14. More than half of organizations are most likely to adopt AI or machine learning over the next year (source)

This makes artificial intelligence (AI) or machine learning (ML) the leading cloud capability for adoption in the next 12 months.

The Foundry survey asked respondents to select all cloud capabilities they are most likely to use in the following year. Here’s the full list of responses:

• AI/ML: 53%
• Security: 46%
• Disaster recovery: 46%
• Software as a service (SaaS): 40%
• Big data: 38%
• Analytics: 33%
• Serverless computing: 31%
• Infrastructure as a service (IaaS): 31%
• Compliance: 30%
• Platform as a service: 29%
• Business process automation: 29%
• Multi-cloud management: 26%
• Edge computing: 26%
• Private cloud: 25%
• Data center infrastructure as a service: 23%
• Security as a service: 23%

15. 56% of IT decision makers don’t understand their cloud provider’s plans for AI integration (source)

Transparency from cloud providers could use improvement when it comes to integrating AI tools into their programs, as more than half of IT decision-makers don’t have a clear view of their cloud service provider’s roadmap.

Cloud migration presents new opportunities—and challenges

Business leaders have much to gain from cloud migration, from global enterprises to SMBs.

As organizations continue to adapt to remote work and leverage advancements in artificial intelligence, cloud technology offers opportunities to improve scalability, optimize operations, streamline workloads for remote and on-premises employees, and embrace digital transformation.

However, adapting IT infrastructure to cloud environments, budgeting IT spending for the cost of cloud services and other unexpected costs, bridging skills gaps, and ensuring the protection of cloud data from malicious actors will create ongoing challenges for IT professionals and shareholders. For additional insights about what is happening IT environments, check out this year’s IT Trends: Industry report.