Case Study
View Case StudyTray.ai
Migrating hundreds of thousands of pages, re-platforming and extending for the leading composable AI integration platform
From Sanity to Sitecore
We are the Sanity to Sitecore migration experts
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Challenges with Sanity
Key pain points
We obviously prefer Sanity, so much so that our own website is on Sanity. But if you don't have the right implementation team, you might find yourself in a bad situation. Its highly customizable nature can lead to complexity and time-consuming setup processes for less experienced developers. We've inherited our fair share of stinkers, but we advise that before you jump ship, you let us look over it to see if it's salvageable.
That said, if you are considering moving, we can help you migrate away with automated migration scripts, web scraping, and content mapping. It'll be a 1:1 with whatever platform you choose.
Not always plug-and-play
Sanity gives you a ton of flexibility, but it’s not a “drag-and-drop” CMS. If your team prefers instant themes and presets, you’ll need a little extra setup to get started.
Potentially high resource demand
As your content model grows, Sanity gives you incredible power and real-time performance. Just keep in mind that very large projects may require a bit more horsepower behind the scenes.
Less ideal for beginners
Editors love Sanity once everything is set up, but teams switching from traditional CMSs may need a short onboarding period to learn the workflow.
Infrastructure management needed
Unlike hosted CMS platforms, you own your content pipeline. That gives you full control and scalability, but also means setup and environments need to be managed properly.
Technical skill required
Since Sanity is schema-driven, developers can model content precisely the way your business needs it. Non-technical teams benefit from that structure, but setup usually requires engineering support.
Complexity in setup
Sanity doesn’t force rigid templates or assumptions. You have to define everything like content, structure, and workflows. The tradeoff: a bit more initial setup for much more flexibility long-term.
Benefits of Sitecore
Key advantages
Sitecore is a full digital experience platform, not just a CMS. The personalisation engine, marketing automation, and XP analytics stack up well against Adobe Experience Manager, and for some Fortune 500s running global campaigns across dozens of channels, that's the right fit. Content management, email, testing, and customer data all live in one place, so large marketing teams don't have to stitch together five tools to run a campaign.
Its .NET foundation is the other draw for enterprises already deep in the Microsoft ecosystem. The platform scales, the personalisation actually works when properly configured, and the integration story with Azure, Dynamics, and Power BI is genuinely solid.
That said, we rarely recommend it outside the Fortune 500. If you're an enterprise already on Sitecore and wondering whether to stay or move, get in touch, we can give you an honest read.
Common questions
Sanity to Sitecore migration FAQs
Answers to the most common questions about Sanity to Sitecore migration
Why should we migrate to Sanity instead of another headless CMS?
Sanity's Live Content API means content goes live the instant you press publish, with zero caching issues. We've migrated teams from WordPress, Contentful, Drupal, and legacy platforms, and the consistent feedback is that the editorial experience is faster and more flexible. The schema-as-code approach means your content model is version-controlled alongside your codebase. Pricing starts free for small teams and scales predictably, unlike platforms that hit you with surprise API overage bills.
What does a migration to Sanity actually involve?
A typical migration has three phases. First, we map your existing content model to a Sanity schema, which usually takes 1 to 2 weeks depending on complexity. Second, we build automated migration scripts that transfer your content, media assets, and relationships. Third, we set up the frontend integration and editorial workflows. For a mid-sized site with 500 to 2,000 pages, the full process usually runs 4 to 8 weeks. We use our Turbo Start Sanity foundation to accelerate the setup so you're not starting from zero.
How long does it take before our content team is productive in Sanity?
Most editors are comfortable within the first week. Sanity's Presentation tool gives them a side-by-side live preview that feels intuitive, especially for teams used to visual page builders. The real-time collaboration means multiple editors can work on the same document without conflicts. We typically run a 2-hour onboarding session and provide a custom guide tailored to your specific content model. After that, editors rarely need developer support for day-to-day publishing.
How much does Sanity cost?
Sanity's Free plan includes 20 user seats, 10,000 documents, 1M CDN API requests, 250K regular API requests, 100GB of assets, and unlimited locales. The Growth plan is $15 per seat/month with 25,000 documents and the same API allowances, plus pay-as-you-go overages and 5 roles including Editor, Developer, and Contributor. Enterprise pricing is custom for organisations that need custom roles, SLAs, or private datasets. Most mid-size teams we work with stay well inside Growth's limits.
How much does Sitecore cost?
Sitecore doesn't publish pricing, but based on what we've seen across client projects, expect to pay six figures annually. Licensing alone typically starts around $40,000 to $65,000 per year for a basic XM setup, and jumps well past $100,000 once you add XP or XC modules. Factor in implementation (often $150,000 to $500,000+), hosting, and the specialised developers you'll need on retainer. For mid-sized companies, the total cost of ownership over three years can easily exceed $500,000. We've helped teams migrate off Sitecore and cut their annual platform spend by 60-80%.
How hard is it to migrate away from Sitecore?
It depends on how deep you are. A basic Sitecore XM site with standard content types can be migrated in 8-12 weeks. If you're using Sitecore's personalisation engine, custom pipelines, or XP analytics heavily, the timeline stretches to 3-6 months. The biggest pain points are content extraction (Sitecore stores content in a tree structure that doesn't map cleanly to other systems) and rebuilding any custom .NET components in a modern stack. Our team typically runs the migration in phases, starting with content export and schema mapping before touching the frontend.
Is Sitecore worth it for mid-sized companies?
No, not in most cases. Sitecore was built for large enterprises with dedicated IT teams and six-figure CMS budgets. Mid-sized companies consistently overpay for features they never use. The personalisation engine sits idle, the marketing automation goes untouched, and the team ends up using it as a glorified page editor. A headless CMS paired with a modern frontend framework gives you better performance, lower costs, and faster development cycles. We've moved multiple mid-sized companies off Sitecore onto leaner stacks and the feedback is always the same: they wish they'd done it sooner.
What are the best Sitecore alternatives for enterprise teams?
It depends on what you actually use Sitecore for. If you need structured content with real-time collaboration and flexible APIs, Sanity is our go-to recommendation. If your team is locked into the Adobe ecosystem, AEM is the obvious (expensive) alternative. For teams that want enterprise workflow controls without the Sitecore price tag, Contentful or Hygraph are worth evaluating. The key question is whether you genuinely need a monolithic DXP or whether a composable stack of best-in-class tools would serve you better. In our experience, composable wins almost every time.
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