RDS

When does billing of my Amazon RDS DB instances begin and end?

Billing commences for a DB instance as soon as the DB instance is available. Billing continues until the DB instance terminates, which would occur upon deletion or in the event of instance failure.

What defines billable Amazon RDS instance hours?

DB instance hours are billed for each hour your DB instance is running in an available state. If you no longer wish to be charged for your DB instance, you must stop or delete it to avoid being billed for additional instance hours. Partial DB instance hours consumed are billed as full hours.

How do I access my running DB instance?

Once your DB instance is available, you can retrieve its endpoint via the DB instance description in the AWS Management Console, DescribeDBInstances API or describe-db-instances command. Using this endpoint you can construct the connection string required to connect directly with your DB instance using your favorite database tool or programming language. In order to allow network requests to your running DB instance, you will need to authorize access. For a detailed explanation of how to construct your connection string and get started, please refer to our Getting Started Guide.

Does Amazon RDS provide guidelines for deprecating database engine versions that are currently supported?

We intend to support major version releases (e.g., MySQL 5.6, PostgreSQL 9.6) for at least 3 years after they are initially supported by Amazon RDS. We intend to support minor versions (e.g., MySQL 5.6.37, PostgreSQL 9.6.1) for at least 1 year after they are initially supported by Amazon RDS. Periodically, we will deprecate major or minor engine versions. For major versions, this is typically when the version has moved to extended support or is no longer receiving software fixes or security updates. For minor versions, this is when a minor version has significant bugs or security issues that have been resolved in a later minor version. While we strive to meet these guidelines, in some cases we may deprecate specific major or minor versions sooner, such as when there are security issues. In the unlikely event that such cases occur, Amazon RDS will automatically upgrade your database engine to address the issue. Specific circumstances may dictate different timelines depending on the issue being addressed.

What happens when an RDS DB engine version is deprecated?

When a minor version of a database engine is deprecated in Amazon RDS, we will provide a three (3) month period after the announcement before beginning automatic upgrades. At the end of the this period, all instances still running the deprecated minor version will be scheduled for automatic upgrade to the latest supported minor version during their scheduled maintenance windows. When a major version of database engine is deprecated in Amazon RDS, we will provide a minimum six (6) month period after the announcement of a deprecation for you to initiate an upgrade to a supported major version. At the end of this period, an automatic upgrade to the next major version will be applied to any instances still running the deprecated version during their scheduled maintenance windows. Once a major or minor database engine version is no longer supported in Amazon RDS, any DB instance restored from a DB snapshot created with the unsupported version will automatically and immediately be upgraded to a currently supported version.

How will I be billed for a stopped DB instance?

While your database instance is stopped, you are charged for provisioned storage (including Provisioned IOPS) and backup storage (including manual snapshots and automated backups within your specified retention window), but not for DB instance hours.

Can I test my DB instance with a new version before upgrading?

Yes. You can do so by creating a DB snapshot of your existing DB instance, restoring from the DB snapshot to create a new DB instance, and then initiating a version upgrade for the new DB instance. You can then experiment safely on the upgraded copy of your DB instance before deciding whether or not to upgrade your original DB instance.

What does Amazon RDS manage on my behalf?

Amazon RDS manages the work involved in setting up a relational database: from provisioning the infrastructure capacity you request to installing the database software. Once your database is up and running, Amazon RDS automates common administrative tasks such as performing backups and patching the software that powers your database. With optional Multi-AZ deployments, Amazon RDS also manages synchronous data replication across Availability Zones with automatic failover. Since Amazon RDS provides native database access, you interact with the relational database software as you normally would. This means you're still responsible for managing the database settings that are specific to your application. You'll need to build the relational schema that best fits your use case and are responsible for any performance tuning to optimize your database for your application's workflow.

How do I control if and when the engine version of my DB instance is upgraded to new supported versions?

Amazon RDS strives to keep your database instance up to date by providing you newer versions of the supported database engines. After a new version of a database engine is released by the vendor or development organization, it is thoroughly tested by our database engineering team before it is made available in Amazon RDS. We recommend that you keep your database instance upgraded to the most current minor version as it will contain the latest security and functionality fixes. Unlike major version upgrades, minor version upgrades only include database changes that are backward-compatible with previous minor versions (of the same major version) of the database engine. If a new minor version does not contain fixes that would benefit RDS customers, we may choose not to make it available in RDS. Soon after a new minor version is available in RDS, we will set it to be the preferred minor version for new DB instances. To manually upgrade a database instance to a supported engine version, use the Modify DB Instance command on the AWS Management Console or the ModifyDBInstance API and set the DB Engine Version parameter to the desired version. By default, the upgrade will be applied or during your next maintenance window. You can also choose to upgrade immediately by selecting the Apply Immediately option in the console API. If we determine that a new engine minor version contains significant bug fixes compared to a previously released minor version, we will schedule automatic upgrades for DB instances which have the Auto Minor Version Upgrade setting to "Yes". These upgrades will be scheduled to occur during customer-specified maintenance windows. We schedule them so you can plan around them, because downtime is required to upgrade a DB engine version, even for Multi-AZ instances. If you wish to turn off automatic minor version upgrades, you can do so by setting the Auto Minor Version Upgrade setting to "No". In the case of RDS for Oracle and RDS for SQL Server, if the upgrade to the next minor version requires a change to a different edition, then we may not schedule automatic upgrades even if you have enabled the Auto Minor Version Upgrade setting. The determination on whether to schedule automatic upgrades in such situations will be made on a case-by-case basis. Since major version upgrades involve some compatibility risk, they will not occur automatically and must be initiated by you (except in the case of major version deprecation, see below).

Which relational database engines does Amazon RDS support?

Amazon RDS supports Amazon Aurora, MySQL, MariaDB, Oracle, SQL Server, and PostgreSQL database engines.

What is Amazon RDS?

Amazon Relational Database Service (Amazon RDS) is a managed service that makes it easy to set up, operate, and scale a relational database in the cloud. It provides cost-efficient and resizable capacity, while managing time-consuming database administration tasks, freeing you up to focus on your applications and business. Amazon RDS gives you access to the capabilities of a familiar MySQL, MariaDB, Oracle, SQL Server, or PostgreSQL database. This means that the code, applications, and tools you already use today with your existing databases should work seamlessly with Amazon RDS. Amazon RDS can automatically back up your database and keep your database software up to date with the latest version. You benefit from the flexibility of being able to easily scale the compute resources or storage capacity associated with your relational database instance. In addition, Amazon RDS makes it easy to use replication to enhance database availability, improve data durability, or scale beyond the capacity constraints of a single database instance for read-heavy database workloads. As with all Amazon Web Services, there are no up-front investments required, and you pay only for the resources you use.

When would I use Amazon RDS vs. Amazon EC2 Relational Database AMIs?

Amazon Web Services provides a number of database alternatives for developers. Amazon RDS enables you to run a fully featured relational database while offloading database administration. Using one of our many relational database AMIs on Amazon EC2 allows you to manage your own relational database in the cloud. There are important differences between these alternatives that may make one more appropriate for your use case. See Cloud Databases with AWS for guidance on which solution is best for you.

Which of the following is an example of synchronous replication which occurs in the AWS service? A. AWS RDS Read Replica's for MySQL, MariaDB and PostgreSQL B. AWS Multi-AZ RDS C. Redis engine for Amazon ElastiCache replication D. AWS RDS Read Replica's for Oracle​

B. AWS Multi-AZ RDS

How many DB instances can I run with Amazon RDS?

By default, customers are allowed to have up to a total of 40 Amazon RDS DB instances. Of those 40, up to 10 can be Oracle or SQL Server DB instances under the "License Included" model. All 40 can be used for Amazon Aurora, MySQL, MariaDB, PostgreSQL and Oracle under the "BYOL" model. Note that RDS for SQL Server has a limit of 30 databases on a single DB instance. If your application requires more DB instances, you can request additional DB instances via this request form.

How do I create a DB instance?

DB instances are simple to create, using either the AWS Management Console, Amazon RDS APIs, or AWS Command Line Interface. To launch a DB instance using the AWS Management Console, click "RDS," then the Launch DB Instance button on the Instances tab. From there, you can specify the parameters for your DB instance including DB engine and version, license model, instance type, storage type and amount, and master user credentials. You also have the ability to change your DB instance's backup retention policy, preferred backup window, and scheduled maintenance window. Alternatively, you can create your DB instance using the CreateDBInstance API or create-db-instance command.

What should I do if my queries seem to be running slowly?

For production databases we encourage you to enable Enhanced Monitoring, which provides access to over 50 CPU, memory, file system, and disk I/O metrics. You can enable these features on a per-instance basis and you can choose the granularity (all the way down to 1 second). High levels of CPU utilization can reduce query performance and in this case you may want to consider scaling your DB instance class. For more information on monitoring your DB instance, refer to the Amazon RDS User Guide. If you are using RDS for MySQL or MariaDB, you can access the slow query logs for your database to determine if there are slow-running SQL queries and, if so, the performance characteristics of each. You could set the "slow_query_log" DB Parameter and query the mysql.slow_log table to review the slow-running SQL queries. Please refer to the Amazon RDS User Guide to learn more. If you are using RDS for Oracle, you can use the Oracle trace file data to identify slow queries. For more information on accessing trace file data, please refer to Amazon RDS User Guide. If you're using RDS for SQL Server, you can use the client side SQL Server traces to identify slow queries. For information on accessing server side trace file data, please refer to Amazon RDS User Guide.

How will I be billed for Multi-AZ DB instance deployments?

If you specify that your DB instance should be a Multi-AZ deployment, you will be billed according to the Multi-AZ pricing posted on the Amazon RDS pricing page. Multi-AZ billing is based on: Multi-AZ DB instance hours - Based on the class (e.g. db.t2.micro, db.m4.large) of the DB instance consumed. As with standard deployments in a single Availability Zone, partial DB instance hours consumed are billed as full hours. If you convert your DB instance deployment between standard and Multi-AZ within a given hour, you will be charged both applicable rates for that hour. Provisioned storage (for Multi-AZ DB instance) - If you convert your deployment between standard and Multi-AZ within a given hour, you will be charged the higher of the applicable storage rates for that hour. I/O requests per month - Total number of storage I/O requests you have. Multi-AZ deployments consume a larger volume of I/O requests than standard DB instance deployments, depending on your database write/read ratio. Write I/O usage associated with database updates will double as Amazon RDS synchronously replicates your data to the standby DB instance. Read I/O usage will remain the same. Backup Storage - Your backup storage usage will not change whether your DB instance is a standard or Multi-AZ deployment. Backups will simply be taken from your standby to avoid I/O suspension on the DB instance primary. Data transfer - You are not charged for the data transfer incurred in replicating data between your primary and standby. Internet data transfer in and out of your DB instance is charged the same as with a standard deployment.

How many databases or schemas can I run within a DB instance?

RDS for Amazon Aurora: No limit imposed by software RDS for MySQL: No limit imposed by software RDS for MariaDB: No limit imposed by software RDS for Oracle: 1 database per instance; no limit on number of schemas per database imposed by software RDS for SQL Server: 30 databases per instance RDS for PostgreSQL: No limit imposed by software

What is a maintenance window? Will my DB instance be available during maintenance events?

The Amazon RDS maintenance window is your opportunity to control when DB instance modifications, database engine version upgrades, and software patching occurs, in the event they are requested or required. If a maintenance event is scheduled for a given week, it will be initiated during the maintenance window you identify. Maintenance events that require Amazon RDS to take your DB instance offline are scale compute operations (which generally take only a few minutes from start-to-finish), database engine version upgrades, and required software patching. Required software patching is automatically scheduled only for patches that are security and durability related. Such patching occurs infrequently (typically once every few months) and should seldom require more than a fraction of your maintenance window. If you do not specify a preferred weekly maintenance window when creating your DB instance, a 30 minute default value is assigned. If you wish to modify when maintenance is performed on your behalf, you can do so by modifying your DB instance in the AWS Management Console, the ModifyDBInstance API or the modify-db-instance command. Each of your DB instances can have different preferred maintenance windows, if you so choose. Running your DB instance as a Multi-AZ deployment can further reduce the impact of a maintenance event. Please refer to the Amazon RDS User Guide for more information on maintenance operations.

Why does my additional backup storage cost more than allocated DB instance storage?

The storage provisioned to your DB instance for your primary data is located within a single Availability Zone. When your database is backed up, the backup data (including transactions logs) is geo-redundantly replicated across multiple Availability Zones to provide even greater levels of data durability. The price for backup storage beyond your free allocation reflects this extra replication that occurs to maximize the durability of your critical backups.

How do I import data into an Amazon RDS DB instance?

There are a number of simple ways to import data into Amazon RDS, such as with the mysqldump or mysqlimport utilities for MySQL; Data Pump, import/export or SQL Loader for Oracle; Import/Export wizard, full backup files (.bak files) or Bulk Copy Program (BCP) for SQL Server; or pg_dump for PostgreSQL.

How do I specify which supported DB engine version I would like my DB instance to run?

You can specify any currently supported version (major and minor) when creating a new DB instance via the Launch DB Instance operation in the AWS Management Console or the CreateDBInstance API. Please note that not every database engine version is available in every AWS region.

What is a database instance (DB instance)?

You can think of a DB instance as a database environment in the cloud with the compute and storage resources you specify. You can create and delete DB instances, define/refine infrastructure attributes of your DB instance(s), and control access and security via the AWS Management Console, Amazon RDS APIs, and AWS Command Line Interface. You can run one or more DB instances, and each DB instance can support one or more databases or database schemas, depending on engine type.

How will I be charged and billed for my use of Amazon RDS?

You pay only for what you use, and there are no minimum or setup fees. You are billed based on: DB instance hours - Based on the class (e.g. db.t2.micro, db.m4.large) of the DB instance consumed. Partial DB instance hours consumed are billed as full hours. Storage (per GB per month) - Storage capacity you have provisioned to your DB instance. If you scale your provisioned storage capacity within the month, your bill will be pro-rated. I/O requests per month - Total number of storage I/O requests you have (for Amazon RDS Magnetic Storage and Amazon Aurora only) Provisioned IOPS per month - Provisioned IOPS rate, regardless of IOPS consumed (for Amazon RDS Provisioned IOPS (SSD) Storage only) Backup Storage - Backup storage is the storage associated with your automated database backups and any customer-initiated database snapshots. Increasing your backup retention period or taking additional database snapshots increases the backup storage consumed by your database. Data transfer - Internet data transfer in and out of your DB instance.