Fast Snapshot Restore

Amazon EBS fast snapshot restore (FSR) lets you quickly create a fully initialized volume from a snapshot. This means there's no delay when accessing the data for the first time. Volumes created with FSR instantly provide their full performance.

Here's how to use it:

  1. Enable FSR for Snapshots:

    • Choose specific snapshots in specific Availability Zones.
    • Each pair of snapshot and Availability Zone is one FSR.
    • Volumes created from these snapshots in the enabled Zones use FSR.

  2. Explicitly Enable FSR:

    • It must be turned on for each snapshot individually.
    • Creating a new snapshot from an FSR-enabled volume doesn't automatically enable FSR for the new snapshot.

  3. Volume Creation Credits:

    • The number of volumes benefiting from FSR is determined by credits.
    • Credits depend on the snapshot's size.
    • Use CloudWatch metrics to monitor credit usage.

  4. Considerations:

    • FSR doesn't work with AWS Outposts, Local Zones, and Wavelength Zones.
    • It can be enabled for snapshots up to 16 TiB in size.
    • Volumes with performance up to 64,000 IOPS and 1,000 MiB/s receive full FSR benefits.

  5. Managing FSR:

    • You can enable or disable FSR for your snapshots.
    • Billing applies to each minute FSR is enabled in a specific Availability Zone.
    • Deleting a snapshot turns off FSR for that snapshot in your account.

  6. Monitoring:

    • Use CloudWatch metrics to check credit bucket size and available credits.

  7. Snapshot States:

    • Snapshots go through states like enabling, optimizing, enabled, disabling, and disabled during FSR processes.

  8. Viewing Restored Volumes:

    • Use describe-volumes to see volumes created with FSR.
    • The FastRestored field indicates if FSR was used.

  9. Quotas:

    • Up to 5 snapshots per region can have FSR enabled.
    • Quota includes both your owned and shared snapshots.

In summary, FSR is a powerful tool for quickly creating high-performance volumes from snapshots, but it's essential to manage credits, monitor usage, and be mindful of quotas and billing.