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Hello deepu rs,
Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this item.
Take note that the question explicitly asks for the most cost‑effective solution. While stopping the database after each test may seem convenient, it does not fully minimize costs and has operational limitations.
Stopping the instance only pauses compute charges, but you continue to pay for provisioned storage (including Provisioned IOPS), backup storage, and any public IPv4 addresses. In addition, an RDS instance can only remain stopped for up to 7 consecutive days, after which it is automatically restarted. This makes it less reliable for recurring twice‑weekly tests.
Taking a snapshot and terminating the instance eliminates both compute and storage costs for the running DB. Snapshots are stored in an Amazon S3 bucket, which is billed at a lower rate than live RDS storage. Restoring from a snapshot recreates the database with the same configuration and data.
Let me know if this helps.
Regards,
JR @ Tutorials Dojo
