What migrates, what needs manual work, and how to verify

A real migration is more than content types and entries. This chapter lists what comes across automatically, what needs manual attention, and the checklist to confirm the migration is complete.

What you'll learn

• The full set of content and configuration that migrates

• The items that require manual work after migration

• A verification checklist for content and code

What migrates automatically

The content migration covers:

• Content types and fields, including help text, descriptions, default values, and slug handling

• Entries, including references, localized variants, and entry tags

• Assets and media, with re-linking

• Locales and languages, with master-locale detection and fallback

• Taxonomy and terms

• Rich text converted to JSON RTE, with embedded entries and assets preserved as references

• Environments mapped to branches

• Webhooks

• Roles and permissions, mapped to built-in or custom Contentstack roles

• Marketplace apps and extensions, including DAM apps such as Cloudinary and Bynder

• Delivery and preview token provisioning, with Live Preview and Personalize enabled

What needs manual work

A few items cannot migrate cleanly, mostly because the source redacts or omits them:

• Webhook secret values are redacted in Contentful exports and cannot be read back. Re-enter them in Contentstack by hand.

• Publish rules require reconstruction through the Contentstack Management API, because they are not represented in Contentful exports.

• Users, memberships, and single sign-on configuration require re-invitation and setup.

• Releases and scheduled actions must be recreated and rescheduled.

• Global fields are an optional content-modeling refactor, not required for a one-to-one migration.

Verification checklist

Confirm the content migration before moving on:

• Imported counts for locales, content types, assets, and entries match the exported counts.

• A sample entry resolves its references and renders its rich text.

• Localized entries and fallback behavior match the source.

• Assets carry the dimensions and types your components expect.

Then confirm the code migration:

• The app builds, and the migration check suite passes.

• The homepage and listing pages render published content from Contentstack.

• Reference-heavy and rich-text pages render correctly.

• Live Preview reads draft content where the app supports it.

• Every TODO(migration) comment has been reviewed.

Key takeaways

• Most content and configuration migrates automatically, including environments, roles, and DAM apps.

• Webhook secrets, publish rules, users and SSO, and releases need manual work.

• Verify that imported counts match exported counts before trusting the migration.

• Confirm published delivery, references, rich text, and Live Preview in the migrated app.