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The Cloud SQL idle instance recommender helps you detect instances that might be idle and provides you insights and recommendations to help you reduce costs. This page describes how this recommender works and how to use it.
How it worksThe Cloud SQL idle instance recommender analyzes the usage metrics of primary instances that are older than 30 days. For each instance, the recommender considers the values of certain metrics within an observation period spanning the last 30 days. The recommender does not analyze read replicas.
If the activity level within the observation period is below a certain threshold, the recommender estimates that the instance is idle. Recommendations are generated every 24 hours for shutting down such instances.
Warning: It's highly recommended that you evaluate the insights and in-context charts. Consult with the appropriate team to determine whether the flagged instance is inadvertently idle and can be deleted. PricingThe Cloud SQL idle instance recommender is in the Standard Recommender pricing tier.
Before you beginBefore you can view recommendations and insights, do the following:
recommender.cloudsqlViewer or cloudsql.viewer. Apply recommendations One of these roles: recommender.cloudsqlAdmin, cloudsql.editor, or cloudsql.admin. For more information about roles, see understanding roles and granting IAM permissions.Enable the Recommender API.
You can list idle instance recommendations by using the Google Cloud console, gcloud, or the Recommender API.
To list recommendations about idle instances by using the Google Cloud console, follow these steps:
Go to the Cloud SQL Instances page.
Click View all on the idle instance recommendations banner.
Alternatively, follow these steps:
Go to the Recommendation Hub.
For more information, see Getting started with Recommendation Hub.
In the Reduce Cloud SQL instance cost card, click View all.
Click the Shut down instance tab.
To list recommendations about idle instances by using gcloud, run the gcloud recommender recommendations list command as follows:
gcloud recommender recommendations list \ --project=PROJECT_ID \ --location=LOCATION \ --recommender=google.cloudsql.instance.RECOMMENDER
Replace the following:
PROJECT_ID: Your project ID.LOCATION: A region, such as us-central1.RECOMMENDER: The ID of the recommender as IdleRecommender.To list recommendations about idle instances by using the Recommendations API, call the recommendations.list method as follows.
GET https://recommender.googleapis.com/v1beta1/projects/PROJECT-ID/locations/LOCATION/recommenders/google.cloudsql.instance.RECOMMENDER/recommendations
Replace the following:
PROJECT_ID: Your project ID.LOCATION: A region, such as us-central1.RECOMMENDER: The ID of the recommender as IdleRecommender.If the recommender detects idle instances, it lists them in a table. Each row shows the instance name, a brief recommendation, the location, and the last refresh date.
View insights and detailed recommendationsYou can view insights and detailed recommendations about idle instances by using the Google Cloud console, gcloud, or the Recommender API.
To view insights about an idle instance by using the Google Cloud console, click the recommendation button in the list of instances.
gcloudTo view insights and detailed recommendations about idle instances by using gcloud, run the gcloud recommender insights list command as follows:
gcloud recommender insights list \ --project=PROJECT_ID \ --location=LOCATION \ --insight-type=google.cloudsql.instance.INSIGHT_TYPE
Replace the following:
PROJECT_ID: Your project ID.LOCATION: A region, such as us-central1.INSIGHT_TYPE: The ID of the insight type as ActivityInsight.To view insights and detailed recommendations about idle instances by using the Recommendations API, call the insights.list method as follows:
GET https://recommender.googleapis.com/v1beta1/projects/PROJECT-ID/locations/LOCATION/insightTypes/google.cloudsql.instance.INSIGHT_TYPE/insights
Replace the following:
PROJECT_ID: Your project ID.LOCATION: A region, such as us-central1.INSIGHT_TYPE: The ID of the insight type as ActivityInsight.A panel appears showing insights about the idle instance. The following categories of information are provided along with some supporting charts.
Fields Descriptions and related metrics Disk usage (bytes change) Data utilization in bytes. Sampled every 60 seconds.database/disk/bytes_used. Max CPU utilization The maximum CPU utilization as a percentage.
database/cpu/utilization. Max memory utilization The maximum memory utilization as a percentage.
database/memory/utilization. Max disk read ops count The maximum number of read operations.
database/disk/read_ops_count. Max disk write ops count The maximum number of write operations.
database/disk/write_ops_count. Observation start and end dates The start and end dates of the 30-day observation period.
The following table lists the insight and recommendation that the Cloud SQL idle instance recommender might generate to help you reduce costs. The subtypes are visible in the gcloud and API results.
LOW_ACTIVITY Investigate to check if the instance can be shut down to reduce costs.
SHUTDOWN_INSTANCE Apply recommendations
Evaluate the recommendations carefully and do any of the following:
To examine the recommendation, click View instance.
A banner appears at the top of the page providing a recommendation.
You might find that the instance is intentionally idle and you don't need to shut it down. If it's inadvertently idle, you can stop and delete the instance. Stopping an instance suspends instance charges. The instance data is unaffected, and charges for storage and IP addresses continue to apply.
Exercise caution when stopping or deleting an instance. To avoid the loss of data, create a backup first.
To dismiss the recommendation so that it's de-emphasized and appears dimmed, click Dismiss.
To close the panel without applying or dismissing the recommendation, click Cancel.
You can also export these recommendations to BigQuery and examine them by using Looker Studio or Looker.
What's nextExcept as otherwise noted, the content of this page is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License, and code samples are licensed under the Apache 2.0 License. For details, see the Google Developers Site Policies. Java is a registered trademark of Oracle and/or its affiliates.
Last updated 2025-07-14 UTC.
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