Copy a list - with list items - to another site

The Problem

Have you ever heard this from a client or colleague?  

“I have a list of data on this one site that I need to move to another site.”

The Setup

Aside from the obvious set of SharePoint sites and a list, the only real prerequisite is to make sure you have PnP PowerShell installed.   This blog is running the newer PnP.PowerShell module, which I highly recommend you jump over to.   You can use the link from the introduction for the full instructions, or you can open up PowerShell and...  

Install-Module -Name PnP.PowerShell

The Solution

In a previous blog post, we walked through the process of creating custom view formats to create a pretty nifty dashboard full of cards about members of the Fellowship of the Ring.   For the sake of this example, let’s pretend I made a mistake (which never happens IRL), and I put that list on the wrong site.   The solution is pretty straightforward. We’re basically going to create a PnP site template, add our list data to it, and then apply that template to our target site.  

Step 1 - Connect to the Source Site

The first thing we’ll do is connect to the source site.  

Connect-PnPOnline -Url https://constoso.sharepoint.com/sites/star-wars -Interactive

Step 2 - Create the Template

We actaully have two lists we need to copy. Fellowship Members is the list we care about but, since it contains a lookup column, we need to grab the Middle Earth Locales lookup list as well.  

Get-PnPSiteTemplate -Out Lists.xml -ListsToExtract "Middle Earth Locales", "Fellowship Members" -Handlers Lists

Step 3 - Get the List Data

We’ll use the Add-PnPDataRowToSiteTemplate cmdlet to populate our list instances with actual list item. Because we have two lists, we need to run the cmdlet twice. (So, technically, I guess we’re doing 6 lines of PowerShell. Shh!)  

Add-PnPDataRowsToSiteTemplate -Path Lists.xml -List "Middle Earth Locales"
Add-PnPDataRowsToSiteTemplate -Path Lists.xml -List "Fellowship Members"

Step 4 - Connect to Target Site

Now we connect to the target site...  

Connect-PnPOnline -Url https://constoso.sharepoint.com/sites/lotr -Interactive

Step 5 - Apply the Template

...and we apply our template using the Invoke-PnPSiteTemplate cmdlet.  

Invoke-PnPSiteTemplate -Path Lists.xml

Game Over

Now you’ve got your list(s), complete with data, copied over to another site. All that’s left to do is get rid of the old one, if necessary.