vSphere Replication replicates virtual machine data between data center objects within a single site or across sites. vSphere Replication fully supports vSAN. It is deployed as a virtual appliance in the Management Pod to provide a Recovery Point Objective (RPO) of five minutes to 24 hours.

When executing a disaster recovery plan, RPO and Recovery Time Objective (RTO) are the most important aspects that must be considered. RPO is the duration of the acceptable data loss and it is fulfilled by the replication technology. RTO is a target duration with an attached SLA, during which the business process must be restored. It includes the time for the recovery and service readiness, in a state of normal business operation.

vSphere Replication provides the ability to set the RPO, however RTO is application-dependent.