When you delete an RDS database instance, manual snapshots are retained unless you explicitly delete them. If the source instance is gone but the snapshot remains, you continue paying snapshot storage with no running database attached — the RDS equivalent of an orphaned EBS snapshot.
Parsivex flags manual snapshots whose source DB instance identifier no longer appears in your account inventory, are at least 7 days old (to avoid flagging snapshots taken just before an intentional migration or deletion), and have status available.
Before you delete
- Confirm the snapshot is not required for disaster recovery, compliance retention, or audit obligations.
- Check internal runbooks and backup policies — teams sometimes keep manual snapshots after instance teardown for a defined retention window.
- Unlike EBS snapshots, AWS does not provide a native API to verify whether an RDS snapshot is referenced by another resource (there is no AMI-style cross-reference). Coordinate with the team that owned the database before deleting.
- Deletion is irreversible — restore to a new instance is only possible while the snapshot exists.
Paid plans include remediation scripts with a delete-db-snapshot command. AWS RDS does not support --dry-run for snapshot deletion — review the command carefully before running it.
What triggers this finding
A manual RDS snapshot whose source database instance no longer exists in the account.
Typical fix
Delete snapshots that are no longer required for compliance or disaster recovery.
Example savings
Roughly $0.095/GB-month — scales with snapshot size (e.g. a 100 GB snapshot costs about $9.50/month).
See also: Severity and savings estimates for how Parsivex calculates figures on your report.