Q: Should I migrate the whole site at once or roll it out section by section?

Q: Should I migrate the whole site at once or roll it out section by section?

Really good strategic question — and the right answer depends on your risk tolerance and team.

Short answer: big-bang for small/simple sites, phased for large or revenue-critical ones.

Long answer:
A big-bang switch (everything moves on one date) is cleaner to plan, gives Google a single clear signal, and recovers as one event. Best when the site is small enough to fully QA in one pass.

Phased rollouts (migrate a section, watch it recover, then the next) limit blast radius — if something breaks, only part of your traffic is hit. The cost: a longer overall recovery, mixed signals during the in-between period, and more coordination.

For a large e-commerce or high-traffic site, phased lets you protect your top categories and learn before touching the rest.

Next step: if any single section drives most of your revenue, phase the migration and launch that section last, after you've proven the process on a smaller one.