Release or unsubscribe from a backup plan

Features

Subscription backup plans require upfront payment for a specified period. If you no longer need the plan, you can unsubscribe from it. Unsubscribing is different from releasing the plan.
Pay-as-you-go backup plans are billed based on usage and are non-refundable. If you no longer need the plan, release it after you back up or migrate all necessary data and confirm that the release will not affect your services. Billing stops after the plan is released.

Important

This action is irreversible. Proceed with caution.
Once per calendar year, you can receive a no-questions-asked full refund for one instance of each product by unsubscribing within five days of purchase. For details, see Unsubscription rules.
If your account is overdue for more than 30 days, Alibaba Cloud permanently deletes any retained backups of deleted instances.

Release a pay-as-you-go backup plan

Log on to DMS V5.0.
In the top navigation bar, choose Security and disaster recovery (DBS) > Data Disaster Recovery (DBS) > Backup Plan.

Note
If you use the DMS console in simple mode, move the pointer over the icon in the upper-left corner of the DMS console and choose All Features > Security and disaster recovery (DBS) > Data Disaster Recovery (DBS) > Backup Plan.
In the Actions column of the backup plan that you want to manage, choose More > Release.
Click OK.

Note
After you release a backup plan for an RDS instance, the source instance's default backup policy continues to run as scheduled.

Related operations

After a backup plan is released or unsubscribed, it no longer appears in the backup plan list.
You can also release a backup plan by calling the ReleaseBackupPlan API operation.
If you temporarily do not need backups, pause the backup plan to save costs. For more information, see Pause or restart a backup plan or call the StopBackupPlan API operation.

FAQ

My RDS MySQL instance has been released. Why am I still being charged for backups?

The RDS MySQL instance has been released. However, if you enabled the backup retention policy upon instance release before the instance was released, these backup files will continue to be stored on the Backups page of the RDS console. According to the feature rules, backup storage is free for 7 days after the instance is released. After 7 days, charges will apply.

Therefore, backup fees may occur because your backup retention period exceeded the 7-day free window. Fees are based on actual storage usage and region. For pricing details, see Billing details. If you no longer need the backups, change the retention policy for the target instance to None on the Backup for Deleted Instances tab to avoid backup storage fees.

I never set a backup retention policy after instance release for my RDS MySQL instance. Why am I being charged for this feature after releasing the instance?

For RDS MySQL cloud disk instances purchased on or after February 1, 2024, the default backup retention policy after instance release is Latest. This setting is applied automatically when the instance is created. Therefore, after instance release, the system retains the last backup. Once the 7-day free retention period ends, fees apply.

Note

To avoid unexpected charges, regularly review your instance backup policy settings and adjust them as needed. If you no longer need these backups, manually delete backups of deleted instances to reduce storage costs.

My RDS MySQL instance has been released. Why don’t the retained backup sets appear on the Deleted Instance Backups page yet?

When an RDS MySQL instance is recently deleted (released), retained backups may not appear immediately on the Backups > Backup for Deleted Instances page. Typically, backups appear within 30 minutes after the background instance release task completes. Please wait patiently.