Estimate restore time from backup size, throughput and replay of incrementals.
Restore time is what a recovery objective actually measures, and long incremental chains often dominate it. Taking full backups more often shortens the chain at the cost of storage. Backup strategies are frequently designed around backup windows and never tested against restore time, which is the number that matters during an incident.
Database Restore Time
Restore time = backup size ÷ throughput + incrementals × replay time per increment
Restore time = backup size ÷ throughput + incrementals × replay time per increment Restore time is what a recovery objective actually measures, and long incremental chains often dominate it. Taking full backups more often shortens the chain at the cost of storage.
Backup strategies are frequently designed around backup windows and never tested against restore time, which is the number that matters during an incident.
This calculator takes 5 inputs: Compressed backup size, Restore throughput, Incremental backups to replay, Minutes to replay each incremental, Recovery time objective. The pre-filled defaults are a realistic starting point — replace them with figures from your own environment for a result you can act on.