Terraform Plan Impact Calculator

Work out terraform plan impact instantly with clear inputs, formula shown and shareable results.

About Terraform Plan Impact Calculator

Not all plan lines are equal. Additions are usually safe, in-place updates carry moderate risk, and destroy-then-create is where outages and data loss happen — especially on stateful resources such as databases and volumes, which is why they are weighted most heavily here. Reading the destroy list is the single most valuable habit in reviewing a plan.

Formula

Plan risk

risk = 1 x additions + 2 x in-place changes + 8 x recreations + 25 x stateful resources affected, capped at 100

Worked example

With the default values below, Terraform Plan Impact Calculator returns Plan risk score (0-100) of 77. Change any input above and every figure here is recalculated in your browser.

Inputs used

Resources to addminimum 0: 12
Resources to change in placeminimum 0: 8
Resources to destroy and recreateminimum 0: 3
Stateful resources among themminimum 0: 1

Results

Plan risk score (0-100): 77
Total resource changes: 23
Destroy and recreate operations: 3
Risk level: High - manual review and a maintenance window required

Step by step

1Values used
2Plan risk
3Plan risk score (0-100)= 77
4Total resource changes= 23
5Destroy and recreate operations= 3
6Risk level= High - manual review and a maintenance window required

Assumptions and limits

The result is derived only from the 4 inputs listed above. Anything not among them is not part of the calculation.
In particular, this calculator does not take inflation, tax, fees or charges or compounding frequency into account.
Figures are rounded for display to whole numbers, so totals built from several rounded parts can differ slightly from the unrounded arithmetic.

How these calculators are built and tested is described on the Methodology page. If a figure looks wrong, please report it.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why does Terraform recreate a resource?

Because an attribute marked ForceNew changed. Check the plan for the specific attribute and consider whether the change can be achieved another way.

How is accidental destruction prevented?

prevent_destroy lifecycle blocks on stateful resources, plus required plan review in the pipeline. Never allow auto-apply on plans containing destroys.