{"id":49597,"date":"2026-03-02T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-03-02T17:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/azure.microsoft.com\/en-us\/blog\/?p=49597"},"modified":"2026-03-03T08:40:51","modified_gmt":"2026-03-03T16:40:51","slug":"instant-access-incremental-snapshots-restore-without-waiting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/azure.microsoft.com\/en-us\/blog\/instant-access-incremental-snapshots-restore-without-waiting\/","title":{"rendered":"Instant access incremental snapshots: Restore without waiting"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Today, we\u2019re excited to introduce instant access support for incremental snapshots of Premium SSD v2 (Pv2)<\/a> and Ultra Disk<\/a><\/strong>, delivering an industry-leading snapshot experience where creation, disk restore, and production-ready performance all happen instantly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instant access snapshots of Pv2 and Ultra Disk are usable immediately upon creation, allowing you to restore new disks without waiting for snapshots to be ready. Newly restored disks also deliver near-full performance from the start, allowing applications to resume operations immediately.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For mission-critical workloads, speed matters\u2014especially when every minute of downtime or degraded performance has real business impact. Whether you\u2019re rolling out critical application updates, recovering unexpected issues, scaling stateful workloads, or refreshing environments for development and testing, snapshots play a central role in keeping your business moving forward.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Standard incremental snapshots have long provided a cost-effective method to protect data and create point-in-time disk copies for these workflows. However, this came with tradeoffs: after snapshot creation, data must be fully copied before snapshots can be used to restore disks, and disks must fully hydrate to reach full performance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With instant access snapshots<\/strong>, that wait is gone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As soon as snapshots are created, you can restore new disks from them with near-full performance from the start. This means faster recovery, faster scaling, and faster iteration\u2014redefining what customers should expect from snapshot operations in cloud.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
See instant access documentation<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Instant access snapshot in action<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

When creating incremental snapshots of Pv2 and Ultra Disk, you can opt in to enable instant access using the existing snapshot API. Once enabled, snapshots enter the Instant Access state at creation and can be used to create new disks right away with fast restore performance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instant access snapshots come with the following benefits:<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
    \n
  1. Instant availability: <\/strong>Instant access snapshots are available to restore new disks immediately upon creation, eliminating the wait time for background data copy to snapshot in Standard storage.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
      \n
    1. Fast restore:<\/strong> Disks restored from instant access snapshots hydrate rapidly and deliver near-full performance with single-digit millisecond read latencies and sub-millisecond write latencies from the start.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
        \n
      1. Incremental storage:<\/strong> Instant access snapshots store only the incremental changes made to the source disk after snapshot creation, avoiding the need for a full base snapshot to keep your storage costs low.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
          \n
        1. Cross-zonal restore: <\/strong>Like incremental snapshots in Standard storage, instant access snapshots support restoring disks into a different availability zone within the same region, providing flexibility for deployment and recovery.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

          These benefits make instant access snapshots best suited for time-sensitive scenarios where immediate availability and performance are essential.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

          Common use cases include:<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
            \n
          1. Fast rollback:<\/strong> Before deploying major software upgrades, you can use instant access snapshots to create an immediate recovery point. If issues occur such as accidental deletes, you can restore disks from snapshots to quickly rollback changes, maintain business continuity, and minimize downtime.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
              \n
            1. Uninterrupted maintenance:<\/strong> Instant access snapshots let you begin maintenance immediately after snapshot creation\u2014without waiting for them to become ready. This reduces application downtime and keeps large systems within tight maintenance windows.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
                \n
              1. Rapid scale-out:<\/strong> You can scale stateful applications by leveraging instant access snapshots to create multiple disk copies of your primary instance in seconds, such as adding secondary SQL Server<\/a> replicas. You can also create copies across availability zones within the same region quickly to achieve high availability and resiliency.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
                  \n
                1. Refresh secondary environments: <\/strong>Instant access snapshots let you copy production disks and spin up secondary environments for development and testing in seconds. This ensures your test environment is always in sync with production and delivers high performance right away.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

                  Here\u2019s what instant access snapshots looks like in practice<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

                  For Azure Database Services such as PostgreSQL<\/a>, instant access snapshots are a core building block for backup, recovery, and scaling. Consider a SaaS provider running PostgreSQL for a customer-facing application. During peak business hours, read traffic spikes requiring rapid scale-out of read capacity. With instant access snapshots, the Azure Database Service can create snapshots from the existing instance and quickly create new disks and instances with zero wait time. This allows new read replicas to be brought online much faster than traditional snapshot workflows, immediately serving read traffic with low latency and allowing the application to absorb traffic surges on demand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                  The customer perspective below demonstrates how instant access snapshots transform their day-to-day operations:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                  \n

                  For Providence, instant access snapshots have transformed how we refresh our Epic training and support environments. Instead of waiting on long background copy processes for snapshot creation and disk hydration, our teams can create fully usable disks immediately for the day\u2019s training and support workflows. The ability to refresh downstream environments quickly has been a massive boost to our operational efficiency and has significantly improved the experience for our end users.<\/p>\n\u2014 Chris Calas, Senior Principal Service Engineer, Providence<\/em><\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

                  At Microsoft Ignite 2025<\/a>, instant access support for incremental snapshots is highlighted as a key innovation by Azure Storage product leaders, underscoring Azure\u2019s focus on mission-critical workloads.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                  \n\t
                  \n\t\t<\/universal-media-player>\n\t\t