---
title: "What is a Failover? Understanding Acronis Disaster Recovery"
source: "https://docs.nexcess.com/hosting/hosting-services/acronis-cyber-backups/acronis-disaster-recovery-hub/what-is-a-failover/"
description: "Discover what a failover is and how it works. Learn how Acronis Disaster Recovery keeps your business online during critical server outages."
vertical: "Hosting"
date: "2026-09-21"
last_modified: "2026-09-21"
---

# What is a Failover? Understanding Acronis Disaster Recovery

## Overview

A failover is a critical emergency response procedure. Specifically, it transfers your live workloads from a failed primary server to a standby recovery server. Within your Nexcess environment, [Acronis Disaster Recovery](https://docs.nexcess.com/hosting/hosting-services/acronis-cyber-backups/acronis-disaster-recovery-hub/) facilitates this process. Consequently, your business remains online even if your primary infrastructure experiences a catastrophic outage.

Instead of waiting hours to restore backups, you switch to a ready-made replica. Therefore, you minimize costly downtime and protect your revenue.

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## How a Failover Works

When disaster strikes, Acronis streamlines the recovery process. Here is exactly what happens when you initiate a failover:

1. **You Declare a Disaster:** First, you determine that your primary server is unrecoverable in an acceptable timeframe.

 Failover Initiation

Remember, Nexcess will never initiate a failover on your behalf. You are solely responsible for declaring a disaster and executing this procedure.

 

2. **You Trigger the Procedure:** Next, you initiate the failover from your Acronis console.
3. **The Recovery Server Boots:** Immediately, Acronis powers on your pre-configured standby virtual machine within the Acronis cloud site.
4. **Traffic is Rerouted:** Finally, you redirect network traffic via DNS to this new cloud-based server. Your applications will resume serving users when propagation completes.

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## Test vs. Production Failovers

Acronis offers two distinct types of failovers. Each serves a very specific operational purpose:

- **[Test Failover](https://docs.nexcess.com/hosting/hosting-services/acronis-cyber-backups/acronis-disaster-recovery-hub/run-a-test-failover/):** You use this to validate your disaster recovery plan. Specifically, it boots your recovery server inside a safely isolated network sandbox. Therefore, you can test your disaster response without disrupting your live production traffic.
- **[Production Failover](https://docs.nexcess.com/hosting/hosting-services/acronis-cyber-backups/acronis-disaster-recovery-hub/production-failover/):** You use this during a genuine outage. It promotes your standby recovery server to act as your live production environment. Furthermore, Acronis automatically begins backing up this newly active cloud server.

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## Crucial Considerations

Before executing a failover, you must understand the following operational mechanics:

- **Strict 7-Day Timeline:** A production failover is strictly a temporary emergency state. Consequently, you have a strict maximum of seven days to complete a failback.
- **The Failback Procedure:** You must execute a failback to return your live workloads to your repaired primary Nexcess server.
- **Test Teardowns:** You must manually tear down test failovers after validation. Simply powering off the test server does not properly end the test.