Stopping an Amazon RDS DB instance temporarily

You can stop your DB instance intermittently for temporary testing or for a daily development activity. The most common use case is cost optimization.

The time to stop your DB instance varies depending on factors such as the instance class, network state, DB engine type, and database state. The process can take several minutes. The service must perform the following actions:

• Shut down database engine processes.

• Shut down RDS platform processes.

• Detach the EBS storage volumes associated with your DB instance.

• Terminate the underlying Amazon EC2 instance.

Warning

Starting a DB instance requires instance recovery and can take from minutes to hours. Therefore, if instance availability is a concern, be cautious about stopping a production instance temporarily. For more information, see Starting an Amazon RDS DB instance that was previously stopped.

To stop and start your DB instance in the same operation, reboot the DB instance. For more information, see Rebooting a DB instance.

Use cases for stopping your DB instance

Stopping and starting a DB instance is faster than creating a DB snapshot, deleting your DB instance, and then restoring the snapshot when you want to access the instance. Common use cases for stopping an instance include the following:

• Cost optimization – For non-production databases, you can stop your Amazon RDS DB instance temporarily to save money. While the instance is stopped, you're not charged for DB instance hours.

  Important

  While your DB instance is stopped, you are charged for provisioned storage (including Provisioned IOPS). You're also charged for backup storage, including manual snapshots and automated backups within your specified retention window. However, you're not charged for DB instance hours. For more information, see Billing FAQs.

• Daily development – If you maintain a DB instance for development purposes, you can start the instance when it's needed and then shut down the instance when it's not needed.

• Testing – You might need a temporary DB instance to test backup and recovery procedures, migrations, application upgrades, or related activities. In these use cases, you can stop the DB instance when it's not needed.

• Training – If you're conducting training in RDS, you might need to start DB instances during the training session and shut them down afterward.

Supported DB engines, instance classes, and Regions

You can stop and start Amazon RDS DB instances that are running the following DB engines:

• Db2

• MariaDB

• Microsoft SQL Server, including RDS Custom for SQL Server

• MySQL

• Oracle

• PostgreSQL

Stopping and starting a DB instance is supported for all DB instance classes, and in all AWS Regions.

Stopping a DB instance in a Multi-AZ deployment

You can stop and start a DB instance in a Multi-AZ deployment. Note the following limitations:

• You can only create a Multi-AZ deployment if your database engine supports it. For more information about engine support, see Supported Regions and DB engines for Multi-AZ DB clusters in Amazon RDS.

• RDS for SQL Server doesn't support stopping a DB instance in a Multi-AZ deployment. For more information, see Microsoft SQL Server Multi-AZ deployment limitations, notes, and recommendations.

• A long time might be required to stop a DB instance. If you have at least one backup after a previous failover, then you can speed up the stop operation by performing a reboot with failover operation. For more information, see Rebooting a DB instance.

How stopping a DB instance works

The stopping operation occurs in the following stages:

1. The DB instance initiates the normal shutdown process.

   The status of the DB instance changes to stopping.

2. The instance stops running, up to a maximum of 7 consecutive days.

   The status of the DB instance changes to stopped.

Characteristics of a stopped DB instance

When in a stopped state, your DB instance has the following characteristics:

• Your stopped DB instance retains the following:

  • Instance ID

  • Domain Name Server (DNS) endpoint

  • Parameter group

  • Security group

  • Option group

  • Amazon S3 transaction logs (necessary for a point-in-time restore)

  When you restart a DB instance, it has the same configuration as when you stopped it.

• Any storage volumes remain attached to the DB instance, and their data is kept. RDS deletes any data stored in the RAM of the DB instance.

  While your DB instance is stopped, you are charged for provisioned storage (including Provisioned IOPS). You're also charged for backup storage, including manual snapshots and automated backups within your specified retention window.

• RDS removes pending actions, including scheduled maintenance updates, except for pending actions for the option group or DB parameter group of the DB instance.

Note

Occasionally, an RDS for PostgreSQL DB instance doesn't shut down cleanly. If this happens, you see that the instance goes through a recovery process when you restart it later. This is expected behavior of the database engine, intended to protect database integrity. Some memory-based statistics and counters don't retain history and are re-initialized after restart, to capture the operational workload moving forward.

Automatic restart of a stopped DB instance

If you don't manually start your DB instance after it is stopped for seven consecutive days, RDS automatically starts your DB instance for you. This way, your instance doesn't fall behind any required maintenance updates. To learn how to stop and start your instance on a schedule, see How can I use Step Functions to stop an Amazon RDS instance for longer than 7 days?.

Limitations of stopping your DB instance

The following are some limitations of the stopping operation:

• You can't stop a DB instance that has a read replica, or that is a read replica.

• You can't modify a stopped DB instance.

• You can't delete an option group that is associated with a stopped DB instance.

• You can't delete a DB parameter group that is associated with a stopped DB instance.

• In a Multi-AZ deployment, note the following limitations:

  • You can't stop an RDS for SQL Server DB instance.

  • The primary and secondary Availability Zones might be switched after you start the DB instance.

Additional limitations apply to RDS Custom for SQL Server. For more information, see Starting and stopping an RDS Custom for SQL Server DB instance.

Option and parameter group considerations

You can't remove persistent options (including permanent options) from an option group if there are DB instances associated with that option group. This functionality is also true of any DB instance with a state of stopping, stopped, or starting.

You can change the option group or DB parameter group that is associated with a stopped DB instance. However, the change doesn't occur until the next time you start the DB instance. If you chose to apply changes immediately, the change occurs when you start the DB instance. Otherwise the change occurs during the next maintenance window after you start the DB instance.

Public IP address considerations

When you stop a DB instance, it retains its DNS endpoint. If you stop a DB instance that has a public IP address, Amazon RDS releases its public IP address. When the DB instance is restarted, it has a different public IP address.

Note

You should always connect to a DB instance using the DNS endpoint, not the IP address.

Stopping a DB instance temporarily: basic steps

You can stop a DB using the AWS Management Console, the AWS CLI, or the RDS API.

Console

To stop a DB instance

1. Sign in to the AWS Management Console and open the Amazon RDS console at https://console.aws.amazon.com/rds/.

2. In the navigation pane, choose Databases, and then choose the DB instance that you want to stop.

3. For Actions, choose Stop temporarily.

4. In the Stop DB instance temporarily window, select the acknowledgement that the DB instance will restart automatically after 7 days.

5. (Optional) Select Save the DB instance in a snapshot and enter the snapshot name for Snapshot name. Choose this option if you want to create a snapshot of the DB instance before stopping it.

6. Choose Stop temporarily to stop the DB instance, or choose Cancel to cancel the operation.

AWS CLI

To stop a DB instance by using the AWS CLI, call the stop-db-instance command with the following option:

• --db-instance-identifier – the name of the DB instance.

Example

aws rds stop-db-instance --db-instance-identifier mydbinstance

RDS API

To stop a DB instance by using the Amazon RDS API, call the StopDBInstance operation with the following parameter:

• DBInstanceIdentifier – the name of the DB instance.