Hot disaster recovery refers to a disaster recovery (DR) approach where a fully operational backup site—called a “hot site”—is maintained as a real-time mirror of the primary production environment. This site is equipped with all necessary hardware, software, and continuously synchronized data, allowing for immediate or near-instantaneous failover in the event of a disaster or critical outage.

The hot site is a full replica of the primary site, including infrastructure, applications, and data. Data is kept up to date through real-time or frequent synchronization. Immediate Failover: In the event of a failure at the primary site, operations can be switched over to the hot site with minimal downtime—often within minutes or seconds—ensuring business continuity. Minimal Data Loss: Because data is continuously replicated, the risk of data loss is extremely low, making this approach ideal for organizations with stringent recovery point objectives (RPOs) and recovery time objectives (RTOs).

Synonyms:
Hot Disaster Recovery Site, Hot DR Site, Hot Disaster Recovery