# Missing Pause Schedule for Non-Production Redshift Provisioned Clusters Canonical: https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/missing-pause-schedule-for-non-production-redshift-provisioned-clusters Development, test and staging Redshift provisioned clusters are typically used during working hours and by scheduled test runs, but they stay available... By: PointFive Updated: 2026-09-28 [Cloud Efficiency Hub](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub) The short version Development, test and staging Redshift provisioned clusters are typically used during working hours and by scheduled test runs, but they stay available around the clock because nobody set up a pause and resume schedule. PointFive Research Cloud cost research at PointFive AWS service [AWS Redshift](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/cloud-services/aws-redshift) Category [Databases](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/service-category/databases) Reference CER-0364 Type Inefficient Configuration ## Explanation Why the waste happens and who it affects. Every night and weekend hour is billed at the full node-hour rate for every node, even though the cluster has no connections for most of that time. Redshift supports pausing a provisioned cluster, which suspends on-demand compute billing while keeping the data, and supports recurring scheduled pause and resume actions. The waste affects teams that keep one or more full-size non-production copies of a production warehouse, and it is invisible in utilization reviews that only look at daily averages. ## Billing model The pricing dimensions that drive this cost. Pausing changes what a provisioned cluster is billed for. Available cluster Each compute node is billed per hour at the on-demand rate for as long as the cluster is available Paused cluster On-demand compute billing is suspended, and only the cluster's storage continues to incur charges Pause and resume transitions Partial hours are billed in one-second increments after a billable status change such as pausing or resuming Reserved nodes Billed for every hour of the term regardless of whether the cluster is running, so pausing a reserved cluster saves nothing on compute ## How to detect 5 checks to find it in your estate. - Identify non-production clusters by tag, account or naming convention and list their scheduled actions (for example with the describe-scheduled-actions CLI command) to find clusters with no pause and resume schedule - Plot DatabaseConnections and CPUUtilization at hourly granularity over several weeks; long daily and weekend windows with zero connections indicate a cluster that could be paused - Check SYS\_QUERY\_HISTORY for the time ranges when user and ETL queries actually run, including any overnight test or load jobs that a schedule must allow for - Confirm the cluster is billed on-demand rather than covered by reserved nodes, since pausing only reduces on-demand compute charges - Check that the cluster is eligible to pause: EC2-Classic clusters, HSM clusters and clusters with automated snapshots turned off cannot be paused ## How to fix 5 ways to remove the waste. - Create a recurring pause and resume schedule for the hours the cluster is not needed; the Redshift console creates two scheduled actions, suffixed -pause and -resume, for the chosen date range - Allow for resume time in the schedule: resuming can take several minutes before queries can run, and query performance can be affected for a period while the cluster re-hydrates - Update CloudWatch alarms that fire on missing metrics, because a paused cluster does not emit hardware metrics, and move maintenance-sensitive scheduled actions (snapshots, resizes) to hours when the cluster is running, since they are not performed while paused - Keep reserved node coverage for production clusters that run continuously, and leave schedulable non-production clusters on on-demand pricing so pausing actually reduces cost - For non-production workloads with short, unpredictable bursts of use, evaluate Redshift Serverless, which does not bill compute when no queries are running ## Documentation Vendor references for pricing and configuration. - [Pausing and resuming a cluster docs.aws.amazon.com](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/redshift/latest/mgmt/rs-mgmt-pause-resume-cluster.html) - [Cluster operations docs.aws.amazon.com](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/redshift/latest/mgmt/managing-cluster-operations.html) - [Amazon Redshift Pricing aws.amazon.com](https://aws.amazon.com/redshift/pricing/) - [Reserved nodes docs.aws.amazon.com](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/redshift/latest/mgmt/purchase-reserved-node-instance.html) ## Related inefficiencies [Browse the library](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub) - AWS Redshift CER-0363 ### [Inactive Redshift Provisioned Cluster](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/inactive-redshift-provisioned-cluster) A provisioned Amazon Redshift cluster bills every compute node for every hour it is available, whether or not any query runs. Clusters created for a proof of concept, a migration, a one-off analysis or a reporting workload that has since... Databases - AWS Redshift CER-0365 ### [Low Reserved Node Coverage for Steady-State Redshift Provisioned Clusters](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/low-reserved-node-coverage-for-steady-state-redshift-provisioned-clusters) Production Redshift provisioned clusters usually run continuously with a fixed node type and node count for long periods, which is exactly the usage pattern reserved nodes are designed for. When those nodes are billed at on-demand rates,... Databases - AWS Redshift CER-0366 ### [Overprovisioned Base Capacity in Redshift Serverless Workgroups](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/overprovisioned-base-capacity-in-redshift-serverless-workgroups) Redshift Serverless bills compute in RPU-hours for the capacity in use while queries run, and the base capacity setting of a workgroup determines the capacity Redshift uses to serve queries. The default base capacity is 128 RPUs, and many... Databases --- Source: the public page above. Product screenshots and illustrative interfaces are examples, not live customer data.