Introduction
Disaster recovery (DR) is a critical aspect of business continuity, ensuring that applications remain available in the face of unexpected failures such as hardware malfunctions, cyberattacks, or natural disasters. Traditional disaster recovery methods often involve complex manual processes, making them costly and error-prone.
AWS Elastic Disaster Recovery (AWS DRS) provides a fully managed, scalable, and automated disaster recovery solution, allowing businesses to replicate workloads from on-premises or cloud environments to AWS with minimal downtime.
In this blog, we’ll explore AWS DRS and walk through the step-by-step process of setting up disaster recovery for a virtual machine (VM).
Step 2: Setting Up AWS Elastic Disaster Recovery
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Navigate to AWS DRS Console
- Open the AWS Management Console → Search for Elastic Disaster Recovery.
- Click Get Started if using AWS DRS for the first time.
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Download and Install the AWS Replication Agent
- Go to Source Servers → Click Add Server.
- Refer to this documentation to get installation instructions as per OS Type - https://docs.aws.amazon.com/drs/latest/userguide/adding-servers.html
- Run the command on the source VM (Example for Linux):
wget -O ./aws-replication-installer-init https://aws-elastic-disaster-recovery-us-east-1.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/latest/linux/aws-replication-installer-init
chmod +x aws-replication-installer-init; sudo ./aws-replication-installer-init
After the DRS agent installation & configuration is complete the EC2 will show up in the Source Servers. After which it will start the initial sync for becoming "Ready to Recovery".
Step 3: Configuring Replication Settings
- Go to Replication Settings in AWS DRS.
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Define replication parameters:
- Replication Server Instance Type – Select an appropriate instance.
- EBS Volume Type – Choose based on performance needs.
- Encryption & Data Retention Settings – Enable encryption for security.
- Save and Apply settings – AWS is ready for replication.
Step 4: Performing a Recovery Drill (Non-Disruptive Test)
Once the sync and snapshots are complete, we can proceed to initiate the recovery drill.
- Select a VM in AWS DRS Console → Click Launch Recovery Instances.
- Choose Test Recovery Mode to avoid affecting production.
- AWS will create a temporary recovery instance in your target AWS region/AZ.
- Validate application functionality and ensure the data is consistent.
- Once confirmed, terminate the test recovery instance.
Step 5: Enabling Failback (Post-Disaster Recovery)
Once the source environment is restored, you need to reverse replication to return workloads to their original location.
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Initiate Failback Process in AWS DRS:
- Select the failed over instance.
- Click Reverse Replication.
- AWS will sync the latest data back to the original VM.
Cost Considerations for AWS DRS
AWS DRS pricing depends on:
💰 Storage Costs – Data stored in Amazon S3 and EBS snapshots.
💰 Compute Costs – Recovery instances running in AWS.
💰 Data Transfer Costs – Replication traffic from source to AWS.
Cost Optimization Tips:
✅ Use lower-tier EBS volumes for replication storage.
✅ Terminate unused recovery instances to avoid charges.
✅ Perform periodic DR drills to validate without excess costs.
Conclusion
AWS Elastic Disaster Recovery is a powerful, automated, and scalable solution for VM disaster recovery. With its continuous replication, fast failover, and automated recovery processes, AWS DRS helps minimize downtime and protect critical workloads.
✅ Key Takeaways:
- AWS DRS simplifies disaster recovery automation.
- Perform non-disruptive recovery drills to validate failover readiness.
- Failback support ensures business continuity after an outage.
Contributed By: Raj Shah
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