Creating a DB cluster snapshot - Amazon Aurora
Determining whether the snapshot is available

Creating a DB cluster snapshot

Amazon RDS creates a storage volume snapshot of your DB cluster, backing up the entire DB cluster and not just individual databases. When you create a DB cluster snapshot, you need to identify which DB cluster you are going to back up, and then give your DB cluster snapshot a name so you can restore from it later. The amount of time it takes to create a DB cluster snapshot varies with the size of your databases. Because the snapshot includes the entire storage volume, the size of files, such as temporary files, also affects the amount of time it takes to create the snapshot.

Note

Your DB cluster must be in the available state to take a DB cluster snapshot.

Unlike automated backups, manual snapshots aren't subject to the backup retention period. Snapshots don't expire.

For very long-term backups, we recommend exporting snapshot data to Amazon S3. If the major version of your DB engine is no longer supported, you can't restore to that version from a snapshot. For more information, see Exporting DB cluster snapshot data to Amazon S3.

You can create a DB cluster snapshot using the AWS Management Console, the AWS CLI, or the RDS API.

To create a DB cluster snapshot

  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 Snapshots.

    The Manual snapshots list appears.

  3. Choose Take snapshot.

    The Take DB snapshot window appears.

  4. For Snapshot type, select DB cluster.

    Take DB snapshot.

  5. Choose the DB cluster for which you want to take a snapshot.

  6. Enter the Snapshot name.

  7. Choose Take snapshot.

    The Manual snapshots list appears, with the new DB cluster snapshot's status shown as Creating. After its status is Available, you can see its creation time.

When you create a DB cluster snapshot using the AWS CLI, you need to identify which DB cluster you are going to back up, and then give your DB cluster snapshot a name so you can restore from it later. You can do this by using the AWS CLI create-db-cluster-snapshot command with the following parameters:

  • --db-cluster-identifier

  • --db-cluster-snapshot-identifier

In this example, you create a DB cluster snapshot named mydbclustersnapshot for a DB cluster called mydbcluster.

For Linux, macOS, or Unix:

aws rds create-db-cluster-snapshot \
    --db-cluster-identifier mydbcluster \
    --db-cluster-snapshot-identifier mydbclustersnapshot

For Windows:

aws rds create-db-cluster-snapshot ^
    --db-cluster-identifier mydbcluster ^
    --db-cluster-snapshot-identifier mydbclustersnapshot

When you create a DB cluster snapshot using the Amazon RDS API, you need to identify which DB cluster you are going to back up, and then give your DB cluster snapshot a name so you can restore from it later. You can do this by using the Amazon RDS API CreateDBClusterSnapshot command with the following parameters:

  • DBClusterIdentifier

  • DBClusterSnapshotIdentifier

Determining whether the DB cluster snapshot is available

You can check that the DB cluster snapshot is available by looking under Snapshots on the Maintenance & backups tab on the detail page for the cluster in the AWS Management Console, by using the describe-db-cluster-snapshots CLI command, or by using the DescribeDBClusterSnapshots API action.

You can also use the wait db-cluster-snapshot-available CLI command to poll the API every 30 seconds until the snapshot is available.