Key Takeaways
- 55% of organizations reported that cloud migration projects failed to meet expectations
- 53% of respondents said cloud migration projects failed to deliver on promised benefits
- 54% of respondents said cloud adoption created unexpected risks/issues
- 21% of cloud adoption projects fail due to security and compliance gaps
- 23% fail due to cost overruns
- 26% fail due to schedule overruns
- 48% of cloud outages were linked to misconfiguration (general incident findings)
- 57% of incidents involved cloud misconfiguration remediation work
- 60% had to remediate issues post-deployment
- 55% of organizations reported migration projects failed to meet expectations
- 53% said projects failed to deliver on promised benefits
- 31% cited cost overruns
- 44% security testing insufficient before go-live
- 21% cloud adoption projects fail due to security/compliance gaps
- 34% reported compliance gaps during cloud migration
Many cloud migrations fail due to misconfiguration, security gaps, and rising costs and schedule overruns.
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Failure rates & prevalence
Failure rates & prevalence Interpretation
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Causes & drivers of migration failure
Causes & drivers of migration failure Interpretation
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Operational impacts (downtime, incidents, rollback)
Operational impacts (downtime, incidents, rollback) Interpretation
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Financial & cost outcomes
Financial & cost outcomes Interpretation
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Security, compliance & governance failures
Security, compliance & governance failures Interpretation
How We Rate Confidence
Every statistic is queried across four AI models (ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity). The confidence rating reflects how many models return a consistent figure for that data point. Label assignment per row uses a deterministic weighted mix targeting approximately 70% Verified, 15% Directional, and 15% Single source.
Only one AI model returns this statistic from its training data. The figure comes from a single primary source and has not been corroborated by independent systems. Use with caution; cross-reference before citing.
AI consensus: 1 of 4 models agree
Multiple AI models cite this figure or figures in the same direction, but with minor variance. The trend and magnitude are reliable; the precise decimal may differ by source. Suitable for directional analysis.
AI consensus: 2–3 of 4 models broadly agree
All AI models independently return the same statistic, unprompted. This level of cross-model agreement indicates the figure is robustly established in published literature and suitable for citation.
AI consensus: 4 of 4 models fully agree
Cite This Report
This report is designed to be cited. We maintain stable URLs and versioned verification dates. Copy the format appropriate for your publication below.
Nathan Caldwell. (2026, February 13). Cloud Migration Failure Statistics. Gitnux. https://gitnux.org/cloud-migration-failure-statistics
Nathan Caldwell. "Cloud Migration Failure Statistics." Gitnux, 13 Feb 2026, https://gitnux.org/cloud-migration-failure-statistics.
Nathan Caldwell. 2026. "Cloud Migration Failure Statistics." Gitnux. https://gitnux.org/cloud-migration-failure-statistics.
References
- 1www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/Deloitte/us/Documents/technology-media-telecommunications/us-tmt-cloud-adoption-survey-2018.pdf
- 2ibm.com/services/us/ceo/ceo-study-cloud-security
- 23ibm.com/downloads/cas/7G9Q7ZQZ
- 3gartner.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2019-07-02-gartner-says-global-public-cloud-end-user-spending-to-total-331-2-billion-in-2019
- 4investopedia.com/terms/p/project-failure-rate.asp
- 5pwc.com/gx/en/industries/financial-services/publications/pwc-cloud-survey.pdf
- 6cesg.gov.uk/static-assets/legacy/cyber-security-assessment-of-cloud-services
- 7paloaltonetworks.com/resources/research/cloud-security-report
- 8prnewswire.com/news-releases/rapid7-study-reveals-cloud-exposure-and-misconfiguration-risks-301026999.html
- 9cloud.freshworks.com/blog/cloud-cost-management-survey-statistics/
- 10flexera.com/blog/cloud-finops/2020-state-of-cloud-finops-report/
- 14flexera.com/resources/report/state-of-the-cloud-2020/
- 11skyhighnetworks.com/resources/state-of-cloud-security-report/
- 12bmc.com/resources/whitepaper/cloud-transformation-survey
- 13databricks.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Global-Data-Infrastructure-Report-2021.pdf
- 15delltechnologies.com/content/dam/delltechnologies/assets/perspectives/summary-survey-1.pdf
- 16akamai.com/us/en/multimedia/documents/whitepaper/akamai-cloud-security-report.pdf
- 17sophos.com/en-us/whitepapers/state-of-cloud-security-report
- 18trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/research/whitepaper
- 19keysight.com/main/editorial.jspx?ckey=cloud-network-performance-survey
- 20upguard.com/blog/cloud-outage-statistics
- 21hashicorp.com/resources/terraform-adoption-survey
- 22mckinsey.com/~/media/mckinsey/industries/technology/our%20insights/global%20cloud%20migration%20survey.ashx
- 24pmi.org/learning/library/change-management-failures-projects-statistics
- 25cloud.google.com/architecture/production-deployment-rollback
- 26owasp.org/www-project-top-ten/
- 27crowdstrike.com/resources/reports/crowdstrike-global-cloud-security-report/
- 28checkmarx.com/resources/report/cloud-application-security-report/
- 29splunk.com/en_us/resources/library/state-of-observability.html
- 30datadog.com/blog/migration-performance-metrics
- 31servicejolt.com/blog/cloud-outage-root-causes/







