Transferring folders from your personal “My Drive” into a Google Shared Drive centralizes institutional data. However, when migrating large directories or nested folder trees, the process often stops abruptly with the dialogue: “Some items were not moved.” This alert indicates a partial migration failure: Google Drive moved the files that met its migration criteria, but left incompatible or permission-locked items behind in the source folder.
Quick Answer
This error occurs because the migration batch contains files owned by external accounts, assets you only have permission to edit rather than own, Google Forms with linked response sheets, or folder structures exceeding Google’s 20-level nesting limit. Inspect the source folder to identify unmigrated files and reassign their ownership.
Why Google Drive Blocks File Movements
Moving a file from “My Drive” into a “Shared Drive” is not a simple folder change. It represents an ownership transfer. In personal Drive, every file has an individual owner. In a Shared Drive, the organization owns the asset.
Migration Path & Transfer Blocks:
[Source Folder in My Drive]
├── File A (Owned by You) ──> Successfully Moved (Ownership transferred to Org)
├── File B (Owned by External User) ──> BLOCKED ("Some items were not moved")
├── File C (Editor Access Only) ──> BLOCKED ("Some items were not moved")
└── Folder Level 21+ ──> BLOCKED (Exceeds nesting limit)
If any asset in the transfer folder cannot legally or technically transfer ownership to your organization, Google Drive halts that specific item while moving the rest.
Primary Causes of Migration Failures
1. You Do Not Own the Files
In “My Drive,” you can organize documents owned by other people into your personal folders. However, you cannot move someone else’s property into a Shared Drive.
- If a colleague inside your company created the file and shared it with you, you cannot move it unless you are given ownership or the owner moves it themselves.
- Review the mechanics of folder migrations in Why You Can’t Move Folders from My Drive to a Shared Drive.
2. Files Owned by External Accounts
Files created by external contractors, clients, or personal @gmail.com accounts cannot be transferred into an enterprise Shared Drive. Google Workspace prevents cross-domain ownership transfers by default. When a folder containing external files is moved, Google blocks the external files and returns the error message. See Troubleshooting “Move to Shared Drive” for External Files.
3. Google Forms with Linked Sheets
Google Forms that have an active destination spreadsheet for responses often fail migration when moved as a bulk pair. Because the form and the sheet maintain an internal script link, moving them concurrently can trigger synchronization timeouts.
4. Nesting Depth and Item Limits
Shared Drives enforce architectural constraints that personal drives do not:
- Folder Nesting Limit: A Shared Drive cannot exceed 20 levels of nested folders. If your migration folder has 21 or more subdirectories deep, migration stops. See Resolving “Limit of 20 levels of nested folders”.
- Item Limit: A single Shared Drive can hold a maximum of 400,000 files, folders, and shortcuts. If your bulk migration pushes the drive over this ceiling, the remaining queue fails. See Resolving “Item limit reached” in Google Shared Drives.
Step-by-Step Triage & Resolution
Step 1: Isolate the Leftover Files
After the error appears, open the source folder in your personal “My Drive.” Google Drive leaves all unmigrated items in their original location.
- Navigate to the source folder in drive.google.com.
- Look at the Owner column.
- Any file where the owner is listed as someone other than me was blocked due to ownership transfer rules.
Step 2: Filter and Reassign Internal Ownership
For files owned by coworkers inside your organization:
- Contact the file owner.
- Ask them to transfer ownership to you (Open file > Share > click their role drop-down > select Transfer ownership).
- If ownership transfer fails between two internal accounts, consult Error: “Ownership of this file cannot be transferred”.
- Once you own the file, drag it into the Shared Drive.
Step 3: Handle External and Orphaned Files
For files owned by third-party accounts outside your domain:
- Make a copy of the file: right-click the external file and select Make a copy.
- The newly generated copy is owned by you, within your domain.
- Move the copy into the Shared Drive.
- Delete the original shortcut or external link from your source directory.
- If files appear unowned or abandoned, use How to Reclaim Ownership of “Orphaned” Files.
Step 4: Split Large Migrations into Batches
If you are moving thousands of files at once, the Google Drive web application may encounter browser memory timeouts, surfacing generic move errors.
- Do not drag the root folder of a 50GB archive directly into the Shared Drive.
- Create matching top-level folders inside the Shared Drive manually.
- Move subfolders in smaller batches (e.g., 500 to 1,000 files at a time).
- If migrations continue to abort without clear causes, follow the workflow in Fix: “Google Drive was unable to move your files”.