Amazon RDS provides various methods to back up and restore data to ensure data availability, recovery, and flexibility for different use cases. Below is a concise overview:

1. Automatic Backups

• What It Does: Automatically takes daily snapshots and transaction logs during a specified backup window.
• Retention: Configurable from 1 to 35 days.
• Restore:
  • Supports point-in-time recovery to create a new instance.
  • Combines snapshots and logs to recover the exact state at a specific time.
• Cost: Free up to the size of your database; additional storage incurs charges.

2. Manual Snapshots

• What It Does: User-initiated full backup of the database.
• Retention: Stored indefinitely until deleted manually.
• Restore:
  • Creates a new database instance.
  • Useful for cloning or migrating databases.
• Example: Use cases like testing, staging, or preserving the current state before major updates.

3. Export and Restore from S3

• What It Does: Export data from an RDS snapshot to an S3 bucket in Apache Parquet format for analysis or integration.
• Restore:
  • Data exported to S3 cannot be directly restored into RDS.
  • For restoration, you must import data into a new instance using services like AWS Database Migration Service (DMS) or custom scripts.
• Use Case: For analytics or archiving large data sets.

4. Cross-Region Backups