# What are Provider Snapshots?

### Introduction

A native snapshot is a backup created and stored directly inside the infrastructure of your provider.

### What providers are supported?

Currently, we support the following poviders:

* DigitalOcean
* Hetzner
* AWS EC2
* AWS Lightsail
* Google Cloud Platform
* Alibaba Cloud
* UpCloud
* Scaleway
* OVH
* Exoscale

### How a native snapshot is created and retained?

In order to create native snapshots, Weap.io uses the API provided by the cloud provider. Following the preferences of your retention policy, Weap will keep an optimal number of active snapshots.

### What are the benefits of using native snapshots?

* more frequent, up to hourly backups
* more flexible retention
* choose the time when to create the snapshots
* more cost effective:
  * DigitalOcean charges you 20% of the server plan to offer weekly backups. Using snapshots, you will pay only 0.05$/GB/month
  * Hetzner charges you 20% of the server plan for daily backups. Using snapshots, you will pay only 0.01€/GB/month
* securely stored inside the infrastructure of the cloud provider
* simple & fast recover by restoring an existent server or creating a new one


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