Skip to main content

Get Started with Disaster Recovery Testing

Last updated on

Disaster Recovery (DR) Testing validates that your systems can recover from catastrophic failures. DR tests are executed as pipeline stages, allowing you to orchestrate recovery scenarios with validation, failover, and notification steps.

Feature Flag

DR Testing is currently behind a feature flag (CHAOS_DR_TESTING_ENABLED). Contact your Harness sales representative to get it enabled for your account.

Prerequisites​

  • Access to Harness Resilience Testing module
  • Harness environment and infrastructure configured

Create a DR Test​

DR tests are created and then configured as pipeline stages.

Step 1: Create New DR Test​

  1. Navigate to Resilience Testing > DR Testing
  2. Click + New DR Test

Step 2: Configure DR Test Details​

In the Create new DR Test dialog:

  • Name: Enter a descriptive name for your DR test
  • Description: (Optional) Add details about the disaster scenario being tested
  • Tags: (Optional) Add tags to organize tests (e.g., region-failover, backup-restore)
  • Objective: (Optional) Define the objective for this DR test

DR Test Details

Click Continue in Pipeline Studio to proceed.

Step 3: Configure Pipeline Stage​

The DR test opens as a pipeline stage in Pipeline Studio.

Overview Tab​

Configure the stage details:

  • Name: The DR test name (auto-populated)
  • Description: (Optional) Stage description
  • Tags: (Optional) Additional tags
  • Objective: (Optional) Stage objective

DR Test Overview

Environment Tab​

Specify the environment and infrastructure where DR testing will occur:

  • Select an existing environment or create a new one
  • Select the infrastructure for executing the DR test
  • The infrastructure determines where DR steps will run

DR Test Environment

Execution Tab​

Click the Execution tab to define your DR test workflow. Add pipeline steps:

For Example:

Validation Steps

  • Validate pre-disaster state
  • Check backup integrity
  • Verify transaction consistency

Failover Steps

  • Trigger regional failover
  • Switch to secondary data center
  • Activate backup systems

Verification Steps

  • Validate application availability
  • Check data consistency
  • Verify service health

Notification Steps

  • Send alerts on completion
  • Notify stakeholders

Click + to add steps and configure each step's parameters.

DR Test Pipeline

Step 4: Save and Run​

  1. Click Save to save the pipeline
  2. Click Run to execute the DR test
  3. Monitor execution progress in real-time
  4. View results in the Execution History

Next Steps​