Amazon RDS is AWS's managed relational database service for MySQL, PostgreSQL, MariaDB, Oracle, SQL Server, Db2 and Aurora, billed by the instance-hour.
Amazon RDS runs a relational database in the AWS cloud and takes over the standby servers, backups and failover that a self-managed database leaves to its own operators. It is built and sold by Amazon Web Services, the cloud unit of Amazon. A team picks the engine when it creates a DB instance: Amazon Aurora, MySQL, PostgreSQL, MariaDB, Oracle, SQL Server or Db2. Every instance sits in the same AWS account and is handled from the same RDS console, whichever engine it runs. High availability comes in two shapes. A Multi-AZ DB instance keeps a synchronous standby in a second Availability Zone. A Multi-AZ DB cluster commits each write only after a reader instance acknowledges it. When a primary fails, RDS promotes the standby with no administrator stepping in. Read replicas give read-only copies for scaling queries, and point-in-time restore rebuilds a database to any moment inside its retention period from transaction logs kept in Amazon S3. Engine choice decides much of the rest. PostgreSQL instances add partition management through pg_partman, logical replication, PL/Rust and PLV8 procedures, and Trusted Language Extensions. SQL Server and Oracle instances add Transparent Data Encryption, and storage on every engine can be encrypted with keys held in AWS KMS. MySQL, PostgreSQL and MariaDB suit teams writing new applications on open source engines. Oracle, SQL Server and Db2 suit organisations moving existing commercial databases off their own servers, and RDS Custom serves those that still need access to the host operating system. A common first job is a lift-and-shift migration, with AWS Database Migration Service copying an existing database into a new instance. After that, the database backs transactional applications that need a standby ready in another zone, while read replicas take reporting queries off the primary. Credentials live in AWS Secrets Manager and Amazon CloudWatch tracks the load on each instance. Zero-ETL integration feeds the same rows into Amazon Redshift for the data team to query there. On SQL Server, Query Store keeps a history of execution plans, so a database administrator can find the query that slowed down after a release.
Pricing
View plans-
AWS Free Tier
Free
- Free for up to 12 months on select Single-AZ instances, up to 750 hours a month across instance types
- MySQL, MariaDB, PostgreSQL and SQL Server Express Edition only
- 20 GB of General Purpose SSD (gp2) storage and 20 GB of automated backup storage a month
- Accounts opened after July 15, 2025 choose a Free Plan or Paid Plan with $100 in credits, plus up to $100 more for activating foundational AWS services
- Not available in AWS GovCloud (US) or the China (Beijing) Region
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On-Demand Instances
Custom pricing
- $0.016 per instance-hour, billed per second: RDS for MySQL or PostgreSQL, db.t4g.micro, Single-AZ, us-east-1
- Multi-AZ on the same instance $0.032 per instance-hour
- No long-term commitment
- Other engines, instance classes and Regions are priced differently; Oracle, SQL Server and Db2 add license costs
- Storage, I/O, backup storage beyond the free amount and data transfer billed separately
- Read replicas billed as full DB instances
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Reserved Instances
Custom pricing
- $0.0116 per instance-hour effective, 1-year term with No Upfront: RDS for MySQL or PostgreSQL, db.t4g.micro, Single-AZ, us-east-1
- Same instance, 1-year term: Partial Upfront $49 plus $0.0056 per hour, or All Upfront $95
- Multi-AZ, 1-year term: No Upfront $0.0233 per hour, Partial Upfront $98 plus $0.0111 per hour, All Upfront $190
- One-year or three-year terms with No, Partial or All Upfront payment
- Reserved per instance class, engine and Region
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Data transfer
Custom pricing
- $0.01 per GB in and out between Availability Zones, at standard EC2 regional data transfer rates
- RDS Custom and RDS on Outposts are priced separately
Features
- Included: ACID transactions with row-level locking
- Included: Declarative table partitioning
- Included: Native JSON column type with indexing
- Included: Built-in full-text search indexes
- Included: Streaming physical replication to standbys
- Included: Logical replication of selected tables
- Included: Synchronous multi-replica commit
- Included: Automatic failover to a standby
- Included: Point-in-time recovery from archived logs
- Not included: Online schema changes without table locks
- Included: Columnstore indexes for analytics
- Included: Row-level security policies
- Included: Transparent data encryption at rest
- Included: Stored procedures in multiple languages
- Included: Extension or plugin architecture
- Included: Query store or plan history
- Included: In-place major version upgrade tooling
- Included: Open source core under a permissive license
Additional Features
- Seven engines from one RDS console
- Amazon Aurora as an engine option
- Multi-AZ DB instances with a synchronous standby
- Multi-AZ DB clusters with semisynchronous replication
- Automatic failover without administrator action
- Read replicas for read scaling
- Point-in-time restore within the backup retention period
- Transaction logs uploaded to Amazon S3 every five minutes
Best for
- Teams building on AWS that want a managed MySQL, PostgreSQL or MariaDB database
- Organisations moving Oracle, SQL Server or Db2 databases onto AWS
- Applications that need a standby in a second Availability Zone
- Read-heavy applications that scale out with read replicas
- Teams that prefer usage-based billing to a flat subscription
- Teams needing host operating system access, through RDS Custom
Use cases
- Lift-and-shift migration of a database with AWS DMS
- Running high-availability transactional workloads
- Moving reporting queries onto read replicas
- Restoring a database to the moment before a bad change
- Partitioning large PostgreSQL tables with pg_partman
- Encrypting SQL Server or Oracle data with TDE
- Sending operational data to Amazon Redshift through zero-ETL
- Tracking database load in Amazon CloudWatch
- Keeping database credentials in AWS Secrets Manager
- Finding SQL Server query regressions with Query Store
- Upgrading a PostgreSQL major version with pg_upgrade
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