How to Migrate DigitalOcean Spaces Object Storage to Vultr Object Storage

Linux Vultr Object Storage Storage Migration

Published on February 14, 2025•Updated on February 14, 2025

How to Migrate DigitalOcean Spaces Object Storage to Vultr Object Storage header image

Object storage is a critical component for businesses and developers who need to store and manage large amounts of data in a scalable, reliable, and cost-effective way. Vultr Object Storage and DigitalOcean Spaces are both popular choices, offering S3-compatible solutions with robust features like high availability, data redundancy, and secure access. Migrating from DigitalOcean Spaces to Vultr Object Storage offers a few performance differences, including the following.

Multiple Locations: Vultr Object Storage is available in multiple locations, providing you with a variety of regions to deploy your storage volume.
Better Performance: Vultr Object Storage can offer better performance for your applications depending on the instance location.
Enhanced Features: Vultr Object Storage includes a more direct management interface that provides you with more options to create buckets and store objects on your instance.
Centralized Infrastructure: Using Vultr Object Storage together with other cloud services, such as block storage and cloud servers, enables simplified management of your cloud resources in a single account.

Follow this guide to migrate from DigitalOcean Spaces to Vultr Object Storage. You will migrate all existing buckets and objects, then verify that the destination Vultr Object Storage contents match your source DigitalOcean Spaces.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, you need to:

Have an existing DigitalOcean Spaces subscription and generate new access keys to use when migrating to Vultr Object Storage.
Provision a Vultr Object Storage subscription and retrieve the S3 Credentials in the Overview tab.
Deploy an Ubuntu 24.04 instance on Vultr to use as the migration workstation and enable the Limited User Login feature.
Access the instance using SSH.

Set Up the Migration Workstation

Rclone is an open-source command-line-based application used to manage cloud storage volumes. You can use Rclone to access, synchronize, and test cloud storage volumes such as Vultr Object Storage and DigitalOcean Spaces. Follow the steps below to install Rclone on your source migration workstation.

Update the server's APT package index.
console
```
$ sudo apt update
```
Download the latest Rclone installation script.
console
```
$ wget -O rclone.sh https://rclone.org/install.sh
```
Execute the rclone.sh script using Bash to install Rclone.
console
```
$ sudo bash rclone.sh
```

View the installed Rclone version.

console

$ rclone version

Output:

rclone v1.69.0
- os/version: ubuntu 22.04 (64 bit)
- os/kernel: 6.8.0-49-generic (x86_64)
- os/type: linux
- os/arch: amd64
- go/version: go1.23.4
- go/linking: static
- go/tags: none

Generate a new Rclone configuration file.
console
```
$ rclone config file
```
Output:
```
Configuration file doesn't exist, but rclone will use this path:
/home/linuxuser/.config/rclone/rclone.conf
```
/home/linuxuser/.config/rclone/rclone.conf is the Rclone configuration path based on the above output.

Configure Rclone to Authenticate with DigitalOcean Spaces

Follow the steps below to configure Rclone to authenticate with DigitalOcean Spaces.

Open the Rclone configuration file.

console

$ nano /home/linuxuser/.config/rclone/rclone.conf

Add the following DigitalOcean Spaces configuration block to the file. Replace YOUR_DIGITALOCEAN_ACCESS_KEY and YOUR_DIGITALOCEAN_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY with your actual credentials.
ini
```
[dg]
type = s3
provider = DigitalOcean
access_key_id = YOUR_DIGITALOCEAN_ACCESS_KEY
secret_access_key = YOUR_DIGITALOCEAN_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY
endpoint = nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com
acl = bucket-owner-full-control
```
Save and close the file.

The above configuration creates a new cloud storage block that uses DigitalOcean as the provider. The configuration uses the access_key_id and secret_access_key credentials to authenticate with the nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com endpoint to access all DigitalOcean spaces buckets in your account.
Test the Rclone configuration and verify that the DigitalOcean configuration is active.
console
```
$ rclone listremotes
```
Output:
```
dg:
```

Configure Rclone to Authenticate with Vultr Object Storage

Follow the steps below to configure Rclone to authenticate with Vultr Object Storage.

Open the Rclone configuration file.

console

$ nano  /home/linuxuser/.config/rclone/rclone.conf

Add the following Vultr Object Storage configuration block to the file. Replace ewr1.vultrobjects.com with your actual Vultr Object Storage hostname and YOUR_VULTR_ACCESS_KEY, YOUR_VULTR_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY with your actual S3 credentials.
ini
```
[vultr]
type = s3
provider = Other
access_key_id = YOUR_VULTR_ACCESS_KEY
secret_access_key = YOUR_VULTR_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY
endpoint = ewr1.vultrobjects.com
env_auth = false
```
Save and close the file.

The above Rclone configuration block authenticates with the Vultr S3-compatible endpoint ewr1.vultrobjects.com using your S3 credentials to access all buckets in your subscription.
Test the Rclone configuration and verify that your Vultr Object Storage configuration is active.
console
```
$ rclone listremotes
```
Output:
```
dg:
vultr:
```

Show the Rclone configuration and verify your credentials to use when migrating.

                            console
                            
$ rclone config show

Your output should be similar to the one below.

[dg]
type = s3
provider = DigitalOcean
access_key_id = example-access-key123
secret_access_key = example-secret-key123
endpoint = nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com
acl = bucket-owner-full-control

[vultr]
type = s3
provider = Other
access_key_id = example-access-key123
secret_access_key = example-secret-key123
endpoint = ewr1.vultrobjects.com
env_auth = false

Migrate Buckets From DigitalOcean Spaces to Vultr Object Storage

You can migrate individual DigitalOcean objects or entire storage buckets to Vultr Object Storage. Follow the steps below to transfer all DigitalOcean Spaces buckets with all existing objects to Vultr Object Storage.

List all buckets in your DigitalOcean Spaces subscription.
console
```
$ rclone lsd dg:
```
Your output should be similar to the one below.
```
-1 2025-01-21 09:18:18        -1 dgbucket
-1 2025-01-21 09:20:08        -1 dgnewbucket
```
Transfer all DigitalOcean Spaces buckets to Vultr Object Storage and track the migration progress.
console
```
$ rclone sync dg: vultr: --progress
```
The migration process may take some time to complete depending on the size of your DigitalOcean Spaces buckets. Your output should be similar to the one below when the migration is successful.
```
Transferred:      568.451 KiB / 568.451 KiB, 100%, 63.161 KiB/s, ETA 0s
Transferred:           15 / 15, 100%
Elapsed time:        11.5s
```

Run the following command to migrate a specific bucket to Vultr Object Storage. Replace dgbucket and vultrbucket with your actual buckets.

                            console
                            
$ rclone sync dg:dgbucket vultr:vultrbucket --progress

Output:

Transferred:      356.809 KiB / 356.809 KiB, 100%, 89.202 KiB/s, ETA 0s
Transferred:            7 / 7, 100%
Elapsed time:         5.7s

Test the Vultr Object Storage Subscription

Follow the steps below to verify that the DigitalOcean Spaces Object Storage to Vultr Object Storage migration is successful.

List all buckets in your Vultr Object Storage subscription and verify that all DigitalOcean Spaces buckets are migrated.
console
```
$ rclone lsd vultr:
```
Output:
```
-1 2025-01-21 09:37:35        -1 dgbucket
-1 2025-01-21 09:37:39        -1 dgnewbucket
```
Run a checksum comparison to test the source and destination storage to verify that the migration is successful.
console
```
$ rclone check dg: vultr:
```
Output:
```
2025/01/21 10:19:13 NOTICE: S3 root: 0 differences found
2025/01/21 10:19:13 NOTICE: S3 root: 12 matching files
```
The 0 differences found message in the above output shows that the migration is successful and the source DigitalOcean Spaces Object Storage contents match the destination Vultr Object Storage subscription.
Update your application configurations and replace the DigitalOcean Spaces endpoints to use your new Vultr Object Storage subscription.
Delete the source DigitalOcean Spaces Object Storage to avoid incurring new charges, and use the destination Vultr Object Storage subscription in your applications.

Conclusion

You have migrated DigitalOcean Spaces Object Storage to Vultr Object Storage using Rclone. The migration process minimizes downtime and ensures your applications run seamlessly well with the new storage backend. For more information on managing your Vultr Object Storage subscription, visit the product documentation page.