Project Online Is Being Deprecated: What PMOs Should Do Next

Protect Your Project Data and Operations

September 30th is the deadline to migrate your projects from Microsoft Project Online. According to Microsoft (Microsoft Project Online is retiring: What you need to know | Microsoft Community Hub) , “After Project Online is retired in September 2026, you will no longer be able to access your projects or any associated data within the service.” For enterprise PMOs, this is a potential disruption to ongoing operations and reporting. Acting early is critical to avoid loss of data and broken workflows.

Moving hundreds of projects, scattered across multiple business units, is a little more nuanced than simply transferring files. Configurations and reporting structures all need to be backed-up and aligned. Microsoft recommends that organizations begin planning now and back up their projects ahead of the retirement date.

The following are actions you should take now:

The 5-Step Immediate Action Plan

1. Inventory projects and configurations: identify what exists today across your portfolio, including custom fields, integrations, and reporting structures. Create a backup in case something in the migration goes awry, you will not lose all your data
2. Assess current environment readiness: evaluate data quality, system complexity, and anything else that could impact migration.
3. Choose your new platform: determine where your projects will be migrated. Microsoft offers several options depending on your organization’s needs, including Planner, Project Server Subscription Edition, and Dynamics 365 Project Operations.
4. Define your migration strategy: decide whether a phased or full transition approach, based on scale, risk and available resources, is best for your firm.
5. Establish governance and ownership: assign clear accountability to ensure decisions, timelines, and standards are maintained throughout the process.
   What to Keep in Mind

Looking ahead, a few key areas will be critical to your migration. You will need to rebuild and align configurations such as fields, calendars, and resource structures in the new system. Migrating data at-scale also requires ensuring everything is accurate and complete across your portfolio. Finally, thorough testing is essential to confirm that projects, reports, and workflows work as expected before going live.

SMA: The Program Lifecycle Company

September 2026 will be here before you know it. Don’t risk this migration turning into operational issues. Schedule a migration readiness assessment with us to understand your risks and what to do next: Contact Us.

Jacque Keats, CF APMP, is SMA’s Chief Operations Officer and is a recognized industry expert in the field of system integration for project management, with over 30 years of experience developing and implementing award winning scheduling, resource planning, costing, and enterprise project management systems for fortune 500 companies and government agencies.

Tawnia Luong is a Senior Marketing Specialist at SMA: The Program Lifecycle Company. With a background in digital audience strategy, she brings experience in content development and communications across federal, commercial, and non-profit sectors. Her work includes translating complex concepts into content that resonates with her intended audiences.