Performing Entire EC2 Instance Restore

In case of a disaster, you can restore an entire EC2 instance from a cloud-native snapshot, snapshot replica or image-level backup. Veeam Backup for AWS allows you to restore one or more EC2 instances at a time, to the original location or to a new location.

How Instance Restore Works

To restore EC2 instances from cloud-native snapshots and snapshot replicas, Veeam Backup for AWS uses native AWS capabilities. To restore EC2 instances from image-level backups, Veeam Backup for AWS performs the following steps:

1. [This step applies only if you perform restore from an archived backup] Retrieves data from the archived restore point.
2. Launches a worker instance in the AWS Region where the restored EC2 instance will reside.
3. Creates empty EBS volumes and attaches them to the worker instance.

The number of empty EBS volumes equals the number of EBS volumes attached to the backed-up EC2 instance.

4. Restores backed-up data to the empty EBS volumes on the worker instance.
5. Detaches EBS volumes with restored data from the worker instance.

6. Removes the worker instance from Amazon EC2.

6. Creates an EC2 instance in the specified location.
7. Attaches EBS volumes with restored data to the target EC2 instance.

7. [This step applies only if you perform restore to the original location] Powers off the source EC2 instance and removes it from Amazon EC2.

Before You Begin

Before you restore EC2 instances, mind the following limitations:

• To restore an EC2 instance from a backup that is stored in an archive repository, you must retrieve the archived data first. You can either retrieve the archived data manually before you begin the restore operation, or launch the data retrieval process right from the Restore wizard. To learn how to retrieve data manually, see Retrieving Data From Archive.

• When you restore an EC2 instance to a new location or with different settings, Veeam Backup for AWS will restore the instance with one network interface and will assigned a new primary private IP address to the restored instance.

• Veeam Backup for AWS does not support restore of IPv6 addresses, tags of Elastic IP addresses, prefixes assigned to Amazon EC2 network interfaces,  and the source/destination checking settings configured for network interfaces.

• When you restore an EC2 instance to the original location, Veeam Backup for AWS will restore the instance and all network interfaces that were attached to the source EC2 instance. However, consider the following:

• If the Elastic IP address that was assigned to the source EC2 instance is still assigned to this EC2 instance, Veeam Backup for AWS will raise a warning. If you decide to proceed with the restore operation, the address will be reassigned to the restored instance.
• If the Elastic IP address is in use by any other EC2 instance, Veeam Backup for AWS will raise a warning. If you decide to proceed with the restore operation, the address will not be allocated to the restored instance.
• If the Elastic IP address that was assigned to the source EC2 instance has been removed from the AWS infrastructure, Veeam Backup for AWS will attempt to restore this address using the native AWS capabilities.
• If private IP addresses that were assigned to the source EC2 instance are in use by the source or any other EC2 instance, Veeam Backup for AWS will raise a warning. If you decide to proceed with the restore operation, the restored EC2 instance will be assigned new private IP addresses.
• If the source instance still exists in the AWS infrastructure,  Veeam Backup for AWS will raise a warning. If you decide to proceed with the restore operation, the source EC2 instance and all network interfaces attached to it will be automatically deleted from AWS.

• If you plan to restore an EC2 instance to an AWS Outpost, check the following prerequisites:

• An IAM role you plan to specify for the restore operation must have the following permissions: outposts:ListOutposts, outposts:GetOutpostInstanceTypes. To grant the necessary permissions for the IAM role, use the AWS Management Console. For more information on how to grant permissions to an IAM role, see AWS Documentation.
• If an Outpost subnet is specified in the worker instance network settings, restore of an EC2 instance to an AWS Region to which the AWS Outpost is connected may fail. The issue occurs if the default worker instance type is not supported for the AWS Outpost. To work around the issue, change the default worker profiles as described in Managing Worker Profiles.

How to Perform Instance Restore

To restore a protected EC2 instance, complete the following steps:

1. Launch the Instance Restore wizard.
2. Select a restore point.
3. Specify data retrieval settings for archived backups.
4. Specify IAM identity for restore.
5. Choose a restore mode.
6. Enable encryption for EBS volumes.
7. Specify EC2 instance settings.
8. Configure network settings.
9. Specify a restore reason.
10. Finish working with the wizard.