Cloud Computing
Recovery Point Objective
Definition
The Recovery Point Objective (RPO) is a metric that defines the maximum acceptable amount of data loss after a recovery from a disaster, failure, or comparable event. The RPO is expressed as a length of time, e.g., "30 minutes of data".
Why It Matters
RPO determines the frequency of data backups or replication. A lower RPO (less acceptable data loss) means you need to back up your data more frequently, which can be more complex and costly.
Contextual Example
For a critical banking application, the business might set an RPO of 1 second. This requires a synchronous database replication setup to ensure that no more than one second's worth of transaction data is ever lost.
Common Misunderstandings
- RPO answers the question: "How much data can we afford to lose?".
- It is related to, but different from, RTO (Recovery Time Objective).