An example method for virtual machine (VM) live migration using intelligent order of pages to transfer includes receiving a request to live migrate a VM, transferring memory pages of the VM that are identified as at least one of read-only or executable in a first iteration of VM memory page transfer of the live migration, transferring, as part of a second iteration of the transfer, prioritized memory pages of the VM that have not been transferred as part of the first iteration, and transferring, as part of a third iteration of the transfer, other memory pages of the VM that have not been transferred as part of the first and second iterations and that are not identified as ignored memory pages of the VM, wherein the other memory pages of the VM comprise de-prioritized memory pages of the VM that are transferred last in the third iteration.