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Backup tiering

Overview

Amazon Backup offers a lower-cost warm storage tier for Amazon S3 backups that reduces long-term storage costs by up to 30% while maintaining enterprise-grade protection and recovery capabilities. The low-cost tier provides the same performance and features as the warm storage tier. You can configure tiering to move S3 backup data to cost-optimized storage based on the age of objects within your backup vaults.

Amazon Backup tiering provides the ability to optimize storage costs for S3 backup data that is retained for extended periods due to regulatory compliance, disaster readiness, and ransomware protection strategies. You can configure tiering for all S3 backups for all vaults in an account, or create targeted configurations for specific vaults and protected resources.

First, create a tiering configuration that specifies which S3 resources should be tiered and after how many days (minimum 60 days). Tiering configurations can be automated to apply to all backups or targeted to specific resources. When backup data reaches the specified age threshold, it transitions to the lower-cost storage tier while maintaining identical restore capabilities.

This document outlines the steps to create tiering configurations, manage tiered backup data, monitor cost savings, and troubleshoot any issues with the tiering function in Amazon Backup.

Tiering Configurations

S3 backup tiering involves creating a tiering configuration that specifies which resources should be tiered and the number of days before transitioning (minimum 60 days) to the lower-cost tier. To enable cost optimization, backup data must be covered by a tiering configuration.

Tiering configuration creation can be set up to apply broadly across backups of all S3 resources in your account, or targeted to specific vaults and resources. You can create multiple configurations to handle different data retention and cost optimization requirements.

Tiering configurations apply to both existing backup data in vaults and new backups created after the configuration is established.

S3 backup tiering configurations specify:

Configuration constraints:

Creating tiering configurations

Creating tiering configurations

Console

To create an all vaults tiering configuration (default)

1. Open the Amazon Backup console at https://console.amazonaws.cn/backup.

2. In the navigation pane, choose S3 backup tiering.

3. Choose Create configuration.

4. For configuration name, enter a unique descriptive name.

5. Choose All S3 resources in all vaults.

6. For tiering down settings in days, enter the number of days (minimum 60) before data transitions to the lower-cost tier.

7. (Optional) Add tags.

8. Choose Create configuration.

To create a specific vault tiering configuration

1. Open the Amazon Backup console at https://console.amazonaws.cn/backup.

2. In the navigation pane, choose S3 backup tiering.

3. Choose Create configuration.

4. For configuration name, enter a unique descriptive name.

5. Choose S3 resources in a specific vault.

6. For vault selection, select a specific backup vault from the dropdown.

7. For resource selection, choose either:

   1. All S3 resources in this vault to apply to all S3 resources in the vault

   2. Specific S3 resources in this vault to select individual S3 buckets

8. If selecting specific resources:

   1. Choose individual S3 resources (up to 100 total across resource groups in a configuration)

   2. Set tiering down settings in days for each resource group

   3. Choose Add tiering setting to create additional rules (up to 5 total)

9. (Optional) Add tags.

10. Choose Create configuration.

Amazon CLI

To create an all vaults tiering configuration (default) using the Amazon CLI

aws backup create-tiering-configuration \
--tiering-configuration '{
  "TieringConfigurationName":"MyTieringConfig",
  "BackupVaultName":"*",
  "ResourceSelection":[{
    "Resources":["*"],
    "TieringDownSettingsInDays":60,
    "ResourceType":"S3"
  }]
}'         

Managing tiering configurations

Viewing tiering configurations

You can view existing tiering configurations through the Amazon Backup console, Amazon CLI, or REST API.

Console

1. Open the Amazon Backup console at https://console.amazonaws.cn/backup.

2. In the navigation pane, choose S3 backup tiering.

3. View the list of configurations with their scope, transition settings, and status.

Amazon CLI

To list all tiering configurations using the Amazon CLI

aws backup list-tiering-configurations --max-results 50

To get specific tiering configuration details

aws backup get-tiering-configuration --tiering-configuration-name "MyTieringConfig"

Modifying tiering configurations

You can update existing tiering configurations to change transition timing, resource selection, or vault assignments.

Console

1. Open the Amazon Backup console at https://console.amazonaws.cn/backup.

2. In the navigation pane, choose S3 backup tiering.

3. Select the configuration to modify.

4. Choose Edit.

5. Update the desired settings.

6. For Tiering down settings in days, enter the number of days (minimum 60) before data transitions to the lower-cost tier.

7. Choose Save changes.

Amazon CLI

To update a tiering configuration using the Amazon CLI

aws backup update-tiering-configuration \
--tiering-configuration-name "MyTieringConfig" \
--tiering-configuration '{
  "BackupVaultName":"*",
  "ResourceSelection":[{
    "Resources":["*"],
    "TieringDownSettingsInDays":60,
    "ResourceType":"S3"
  }]
}'         

Deleting tiering configurations

You can delete tiering configurations when they are no longer needed.

Console

1. Open the Amazon Backup console at https://console.amazonaws.cn/backup.

2. In the navigation pane, choose S3 backup tiering.

3. Select the configuration to delete.

4. Choose Delete.

5. Enter the tiering configuration name to confirm deletion.

6. Choose Delete tiering configuration.

Amazon CLI

To delete a tiering configuration using the Amazon CLI

aws backup delete-tiering-configuration \
--tiering-configuration-name "MyTieringConfig"

Note: Deleting a tiering configuration keeps existing data in the lower-cost tier but prevents new data from tiering down.

How S3 backup tiering configurations apply

Amazon Backup evaluates objects within backups for tiering eligibility based on their age. The service checks object age on a daily basis and transitions eligible objects to the lower-cost tier according to your configuration settings. Tiering evaluation occurs automatically in the background. When objects within a backup reach the specified age threshold (minimum 60 days), they become eligible for transition during the next evaluation cycle.

Both objects in existing backups and newly created backup objects are subject to tiering configurations. If you have multiple configurations that could apply to the same backup objects, vault-specific settings take precedence over the configurations that applies to all vaults. The tiering process is irreversible - once objects move to the lower-cost tier, they remain there until the backup is deleted according to your retention policies.

Cost structure and monitoring

Pricing model

S3 backup tiering uses a cost-optimized pricing structure:

Cost monitoring

Monitor your tiering cost savings through:

Example cost savings

For a 500TB S3 bucket with 1 billion objects where 60% are eligible for tiering:

Configuration Examples

Example 1: Account-wide tiering

Apply tiering to all S3 resources across all backup vaults:

{
  "TieringConfigurationName":"MyTieringConfig",
  "BackupVaultName":"*",
  "ResourceSelection":[
    {
      "Resources":["*"],
      "TieringDownSettingsInDays":60,
      "ResourceType":"S3"
    }
  ]
}

Example 2:

Tier all resources in a MyBackupVault4 vault:

{
  "TieringConfigurationName":"MyTieringConfig",
  "BackupVaultName":"MyBackupVault4",
  "ResourceSelection":[
    {
      "Resources":["*"],
      "TieringDownSettingsInDays":60,
      "ResourceType":"S3"
    }
  ]
}

Example 3:

Tier specific buckets with different rules:

{
  "TieringConfigurationName":"MyTieringConfig",
  "BackupVaultName":"MyBackupVault",
  "ResourceSelection":[
    {
      "Resources": ["arn:aws:s3:::mybucket1", "arn:aws:s3:::mybucket2"],
      "TieringDownSettingsInDays": 60,
      "ResourceType": "S3"
    },
    {
      "Resources": ["arn:aws:s3:::mybucket3"],
      "TieringDownSettingsInDays": 120,
      "ResourceType": "S3"
    }
  ]
}

Example 4:

Set the rule to not tier a bucket (set tiering to 36500):

{
  "TieringConfigurationName":"MyTieringConfig",
  "BackupVaultName":"*",
  "ResourceSelection":[
    {
      "Resources":["arn:aws:s3:::mybucket7", "arn:aws:s3:::mybucket8"],
      "TieringDownSettingsInDays":36500,
      "ResourceType":"S3"
    }
  ]
}

Supported features and limitations

Supported features

Limitations

Troubleshooting

Common issues

Configuration not applying to existing backups

AlreadyExistsException when creating configuration

LimitExceededException errors

Higher than expected transition costs