How Spacelift Enables Modern, Automated Disaster Recovery
Disaster Recovery (DR) is one of the most critical responsibilities of any cloud-based business - yet it’s also one of the most fragile. Traditional DR processes rely on tribal knowledge, huge runbooks, brittle scripts, and manual steps that fail when you need them most. Active-active setups are great, but add expense and complexity, and aren't always possible.
Most teams don’t lack the infrastructure expertise to perform DR.
They lack a reliable, automated, testable orchestration layer that ensures DR works the same way every single time.
This is where Spacelift changes everything.
At Absolute Ops, we increasingly see customers adopt Spacelift specifically because it enables repeatable, secure, on-demand DR workflows that dramatically improve RTO (Recovery Time Objective), reduce human error, and make DR testing practical.
1. The Core Problem: DR Is Usually “Documented,” Not Automated
In most organizations, DR is:
- a runbook in Confluence
- a set of Terraform modules that “should work”
- a handful of ad-hoc scripts
- and a few senior engineers who “know the steps”
That is not disaster recovery - that’s wishful thinking.
Real DR requires:
- predictability
- automation
- auditable workflows
- repeatability
- non-interactive execution
- testability
Spacelift provides the orchestration layer that turns static PDF runbooks into codified, reproducible processes.
2. Parameterized DR Stacks: The Foundation of Push-Button Recovery
With Spacelift, DR is built as a set of dedicated stacks that can be triggered with parameters. You can use the same IaC as production, but use the parameters to target your DR site.
Example parameters:
- target failover region
- environment to restore (prod/stage)
- snapshot or PITR point to use
- which components to rebuild (networking, DB, compute, app layers)
These runs can be triggered:
- from the UI
- via API
- on a schedule
- in response to a monitoring alert
- through an approval workflow
This transforms DR from a multi-hour manual effort into a single automated workflow.
3. Dependency Graphing Ensures Everything Runs in the Right Order
A real DR event is never one step — it is a chain:
- Rebuild networking & security
- Recreate foundational services
- Restore data (snapshots, PITR, replicated volumes)
- Rehydrate compute and orchestration layers
- Recreate load balancing and routing
- Validate application health
- Cut over traffic
Spacelift’s stack dependency graph allows you to model these steps explicitly, ensuring:
- correct sequencing
- correct state sharing
- automatic rollback
- controlled parallelism
- reduced human error
This is something CI/CD pipelines struggle to model — but Spacelift is purpose-built for it.
4. Secure, Policy-Governed Execution (No Exposed Credentials)
DR often requires elevated permissions. Spacelift reduces risk by:
- generating ephemeral, short-lived cloud credentials
- using RBAC to control who can trigger DR
- validating every run through OPA policies
- storing no long-lived access keys
- executing inside secure private worker pools
- maintaining full audit trails
Teams can safely trigger DR runs without ever having direct AWS or Azure access.
5. Testable DR: The Most Overlooked Benefit
Most companies can’t test DR because production DR is too risky — and staging DR is too manual.
Spacelift makes DR testing a first-class workflow:
- scheduled “DR rehearsal” runs
- ephemeral DR environments for practice
- branch-based DR tests
- validation hooks & health checks
- automatic evidence generation for auditors
Teams can finally perform DR testing monthly, weekly, or even daily without fear.
This dramatically improves operational readiness and audit confidence.
6. Automated Data Restoration Workflows
DR isn’t just infrastructure — it’s data, replication, and consistency.
Spacelift can orchestrate:
- RDS snapshot restoration
- Aurora cluster rebuilds
- EBS snapshot replication
- Cross-region S3 object recovery
- K8s volume rehydration
- Database initialization tasks
- Post-restore integrity checks
These steps become predictable, safe, and traceable — instead of frantic manual commands at 2 a.m.
7. Integrations That Complete the DR Story
Spacelift integrates seamlessly with:
- GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket (versioned DR plans)
- Slack, Teams (approvals & notifications)
- ServiceNow, Jira (change automation)
- Datadog, Prometheus (DR alert triggers)
- SIEMs (security auditing)
- Private runners for air-gapped environments
A DR workflow can automatically:
- Open a change ticket
- Execute the DR plan
- Run automated validation
- Collect evidence
- Close the ticket
And it all happens without human intervention.
8. Auditable, Compliance-Friendly DR
Modern compliance frameworks require proof:
- that DR is defined
- that DR is tested
- that DR works
- that results are recorded
- that execution is consistent
Spacelift provides:
- full run logs
- immutable histories
- artifact storage
- policy enforcement
- run-by-run evidence
This dramatically simplifies passing audits for SOC 2, PCI, HIPAA, HITRUST, and ISO 27001.
Final Thoughts: Spacelift Makes DR a Product, Not a Procedure
Disaster recovery shouldn’t rely on luck or manual expertise.
It should be:
- automated
- version-controlled
- testable
- auditable
- secure
- repeatable
- fast
- consistent
Spacelift is the orchestration platform that makes that possible.
