What’s New in Azure Database Migration Service Hub (September 2025)

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Introduction

On September 17, 2025, Microsoft announced the Azure Database Migration Service (DMS) Hub Experience【Microsoft TechCommunity†source】—a new centralized landing page that brings together everything you need to plan and manage your migration journey.

Migrations have always been one of the highest-risk tasks for DBAs and architects. Even when everything works, there are long checklists:

  • Is the source server supported?
  • Are there schema or feature blockers?
  • Do we have a way to validate row counts and integrity?
  • How do we monitor migration progress?

Until now, much of this relied on manual tracking—spreadsheets, scripts, and separate runs of the Data Migration Assistant (DMA). The new DMS Hub consolidates discovery, assessment, and soon full tracking into one dashboard, lowering friction and giving teams a clear path forward.

Why Label This as “New Tech”?

This isn’t just an incremental update. The hub was just released in September 2025 and represents a new centralized experience within Azure.

Microsoft positions this as the “future of database migration”【Microsoft Learn†source】. The new parts are:

  • A single dashboard that pulls together all SQL Servers discovered.
  • Automated surfacing of SQL Servers across your environment.
  • Assessment integration that ties directly into migration readiness.
  • A roadmap that includes migration tracking and support for other RDBMS platforms.

For your readers, you can confidently say:

“This is a newly announced migration control center for Azure SQL, available now in the Azure Portal.”

Deep Dive: The DMS Hub Features

1. Centralized Landing Experience

Instead of creating DMS projects one by one and tracking them separately, you now get:

  • The ability to create and manage multiple DMS instances in one place.
  • A unified landing page that shows all servers you’ve discovered.
  • Visibility for DBAs, architects, and project managers alike.

Reference: Azure Database Migration Service Overview – Microsoft Learn

2. Discovery

The discovery step is often the most painful part of large-scale migrations. Many organizations don’t even have a full inventory of their SQL Servers. The DMS Hub automates this:

  • It surfaces all SQL Servers across your environment.
  • You can quickly see which are ready for assessment.
  • Each discovery includes metadata (version, edition, environment).

This reduces the need for scripts like:

-- Old school: find SQL Servers via linked servers
SELECT * FROM sys.servers WHERE is_linked = 1;

Instead, the hub performs discovery centrally.

3. Assessment

Once servers are discovered, you can run compatibility assessments:

  • Check whether a SQL Server can migrate to Azure SQL Database, Managed Instance, or SQL VM.
  • Identify unsupported features (e.g., SQL Agent jobs, CLR assemblies, replication).
  • Get size and SKU recommendations for Azure targets.

Traditionally, you’d run the Data Migration Assistant (DMA) separately. Now, assessment results are visible inside the hub.

Reference: Data Migration Assistant (DMA)

4. Dashboard Clarity

The dashboard is a new visualization layer. It includes:

  • Server list view – all discovered instances in one place.
  • Filtering and sorting – by readiness, OS version, SQL version.
  • Drill-down views – dependency graphs, blockers, feature usage.

This makes migration planning more collaborative. For example, a project manager can look at readiness scores while a DBA drills into the SQL details.

5. What’s Coming Next

Microsoft’s roadmap for the hub includes:

  • Migration tracking – track migrations from start to finish.
  • Error reporting and completion metrics – see failures without leaving the hub.
  • Multi-RDBMS support – eventually manage migrations for PostgreSQL, Oracle, and MySQL from the same place.

Reference: Azure Roadmap

Hands-On Example Workflows

Here’s how to put this new tech into practice today.

Example 1: Tracking Migration Projects in Your DBA Utility DB

You can log DMS projects with a table like this:

CREATE TABLE dbo.AzureMigrationProjects (
    ProjectID INT IDENTITY PRIMARY KEY,
    ProjectName NVARCHAR(100),
    SourceServer NVARCHAR(200),
    TargetServer NVARCHAR(200),
    MigrationType NVARCHAR(50),
    CreatedOn DATETIME DEFAULT GETDATE()
);

Every time you create a new migration project in the hub, record it here. This gives you your own internal audit trail.

Example 2: Row Count Validation

Even with modern migration tools, DBAs still need row count checks:

-- Validate row counts between source and target
SELECT 
    'Sales.Orders' AS TableName,
    (SELECT COUNT(*) FROM SourceDB.dbo.Orders) AS SourceCount,
    (SELECT COUNT(*) FROM TargetDB.dbo.Orders) AS TargetCount;

This lets you confirm data completeness before signing off.

Reference: SQL Server Data Validation – Microsoft Learn

Example 3: Using DMA with the Hub

You can still run DMA locally for schema analysis. Export results as JSON and upload them into the hub. This creates a single source of truth.

Workshop: End-to-End Test Migration

Let’s walk through a hands-on workshop you can run in your lab.

Goal: Use the new DMS Hub to migrate AdventureWorks from SQL Server 2019 (on-prem) to Azure SQL Database.

Steps:

  1. Prepare Environment
  2. Create DMS Instance
    • In the Azure Portal, search for “Database Migration Service.”
    • Create a new instance tied to your subscription and resource group.
  3. Open the New Hub
    • Go to the DMS Hub landing page.
    • Confirm you can see your DMS instance.
  4. Run Discovery
    • Point the hub to your local SQL Server.
    • AdventureWorks should appear in the discovered list.
  5. Run Assessment
    • Target = Azure SQL Database.
    • Review blockers (e.g., unsupported SQL Agent jobs).
  6. Migrate (offline mode is simplest for labs).
    • Choose AdventureWorks.
    • Map schema and data to Azure SQL Database.
  7. Validate Migration
SELECT COUNT(*) FROM AdventureWorks2019.Person.Person; -- Source
SELECT COUNT(*) FROM AdventureWorks2019_Azure.Person.Person; -- Target

8. Document Results
Note blockers, resolutions, and elapsed times.

This end-to-end workshop shows how the hub integrates with DMA and DMS to simplify what used to take multiple tools.

Summary

The Azure DMS Hub (new as of September 2025) provides:

  • A new centralized dashboard.
  • Automated discovery and assessment.
  • A roadmap for migration tracking and multi-RDBMS support.

For DBAs, this reduces manual prep work and risk. For architects and managers, it gives visibility into blockers and timelines.

Final Thoughts

Migration is still high-stakes. This new tech doesn’t replace the need for careful planning, but it brings clarity and structure. The DMS Hub is worth exploring now, even if your migrations are months away. Run discovery, build your backlog of blockers, and be ready to take advantage of the new tracking features as they roll out.

References

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