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Snapshots capture the full disk state of a running instance, letting you restore your environment later without reinstalling dependencies or re-downloading models. You can also use snapshots to change instance specifications by restoring to a new instance with different GPU or CPU settings.

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Create a Snapshot

Use the interactive menu: 
tnr snapshot create
Or specify the instance and name directly: 
tnr snapshot create --instance-id 0 --name my-environment
Snapshotting happens in the background—you can continue using your instance immediately. The snapshot captures the exact state at the moment you initiated it.
Snapshots can only be created from instances in RUNNING state.

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List Snapshots

View all your snapshots with their status, size, and creation date: 
tnr snapshot list
Status values:
  • READY: Snapshot is complete and can be used
  • CREATING: Snapshot is still being created
  • FAILED: Snapshot creation failed

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Delete a Snapshot

Remove snapshots you no longer need: 
# Interactive selection
tnr snapshot delete

# Delete by name
tnr snapshot delete my-environment
Deleting a snapshot is permanent and cannot be undone.

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Restore from a Snapshot

When creating a new instance, your snapshots appear alongside templates: 
tnr create
# Select your snapshot in the "Templates" step
The new instance’s disk size must be at least as large as the snapshot. The CLI enforces this automatically.
Restoring from a snapshot can take up to 8 minutes per 100GB of data. The instance shows as RESTORING during this time.

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Best Practices

  1. Name snapshots descriptively: Include the project, date, or purpose (e.g., llama-finetuned-jan2026)
  2. Snapshot before major changes: Create a snapshot before installing new packages or modifying your environment
  3. Clean up unused snapshots: Snapshots count toward your storage. Delete old ones you no longer need
  4. Keep snapshots small: Remove large temporary files before creating a snapshot to speed up creation and restoration

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Snapshots vs External Backups

Snapshots are great for quickly restoring your environment, but they’re tied to Thunder Compute. For long-term data preservation, also use:
  • GitHub for code and configuration
  • Local downloads for important outputs
  • Cloud storage (R2, Google Drive) for large files