Storage policy protection groups enable the automatic protection of virtual machines that are associated with a storage policy.

You use array-based replication to replicate the datastores from the protected site to the recovery site. If you tag a datastore and you create a storage policy that maps to that tag, the datastore is automatically associated with that storage policy. A storage policy protection group that includes that storage policy automatically protects any virtual machines that have been tagged appropriately that reside on the datastore. If you disassociate a virtual machine from the storage policy or move it off the datastore, Site Recovery Manager automatically unprotects it.

When you create a storage policy protection group, Site Recovery Manager performs the following operations:

  • Creates a managed object that represents the storage policy protection group on the local Site Recovery Manager Server instance.
  • Associates the storage policies that you select with the storage policy protection group. Site Recovery Manager protects all compliant storage policies that you include in the storage policy protection group.
  • The local storage policy protection group actively protects the appropriate vSphere entities on the local vCenter Server instance and determines the compliance of the storage policies that it contains. The initial protection of the newly created storage policy protection group includes protecting all the virtual machines that are associated with the storage policies in the protection group, based on the latest known state of the vSphere inventory.
    Note: The initial protection does not include any storage synchronization for the associated consistency groups. You must replicate the storage according to its regular schedule, independently of vSphere and Site Recovery Manager.
  • Starts vSphere inventory monitoring to detect any vSphere entities that are added to the inventory after the initial protection. If Site Recovery Manager fails to protect any vSphere entities, the creation of the storage policy protection group does not fail, but errors appear in the protection group properties.
  • Creates a peer managed object to represent the storage policy protection group on the Site Recovery Manager Server instance on the recovery site. This object is ready for recovery immediately after creation, even if the underlying storage is not yet ready for recovery.

After you create a storage policy protection group, you might need to synchronize the underlying storage to make sure that the protected vSphere entities are recoverable. Run a test recovery with the option to replicate recent changes as soon as possible after you create the protection group.