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Easily Move SQL Tables between Filegroups

Recently during a Data Warehouse project, I had the need to move many tables to a new file group. I didn't like any of the solutions that I found on Google, so decided to create on of my own. The result?

MoveTablesToFilegroup

Click here for a nifty stored proc allows you to easily move tables, indexes, heaps and even LOB data to different filegroups without breaking a sweat. To get going, copy-paste the code below into Management Studio, and then run it to create the needed stored procedure.

Hopefully the arguments are self explanatory, but here are some examples:

1. Move all tables, indexes and heaps, from all schemas into the filegroup named SECONDARY:
EXEC dbo.sp_MoveTablesToFileGroup
@SchemaFilter = '%', -- chooses schemas using the LIKE operator
@TableFilter  = '%', -- chooses tables using the LIKE operator
@DataFileGroup = 'SECONDARY', -- The name of the filegroup to move index and in-row data to.
@ClusteredIndexes = 1, -- 1 means "Move all clustered indexes" - i.e. table data where a primary key / clustered index exists
@SecondaryIndexes = 1, -- 1 means "Move all secondary indexes"
@Heaps = 1, -- 1 means "Move all heaps" - i.e. tables with no clustered index.
@ProduceScript = 1 -- Don't move anything, just produce a T-SQL script

2. Produce a script to move LOBS to the LOB_DATA filegroup, and move table data to the SECONDARY filegroup, for tables in the TEST schema only:
EXEC dbo.sp_MoveTablesToFileGroup
@SchemaFilter = 'TEST', -- Only tables in the TEST schema
@TableFilter  = '%', -- All tables
@DataFileGroup = 'SECONDARY', -- Move in-row data to SECONDARY
@LobFileGroup =  'LOB_DATA', -- Move LOB data to LOB_DATA fg.
@ClusteredIndexes = 1, -- Move all clustered indexes
@SecondaryIndexes = 0, -- Don't move all secondary indexes
@Heaps = 0, -- Don't move tables with no PK
@ProduceScript = 1 -- Don't move anything, just produce a T-SQL script
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Comments

Unknown said…
Great proc! I've seen several proposed solutions to this issue, but this is by far the best I've found so far. I did run into one issue however. When generating clustered indexes to move heaps, it does so with a long list of columns instead of just a single column. The first table I attempted this on, the process failed because the combined length of data in the new clustered index fields exceeded 900 bytes. I tweaked the base procedure a bit to concatinate the first_ix_col_name instead of the index_columns field ( in two places ) and this corrected the problem. Just a patch, I'm sure, but it got me past my first attempt to use this.
March 10, 2014
Unknown said…
This is a great routine, thanks for sharing!
September 01, 2019
vinayaka cn said…
Thank you for your help
January 13, 2020
Anonymous said…
Mark,
This is a fantastic routine, thanks for sharing. I only needed to tweak it a bit for Unicode field types, and it worked great.
February 06, 2020
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