How to Import an AWS EBS Volume into Terraform

Import AWS EBS Volume with Terraback (recommended)

Terraback reverse-engineers your live infrastructure: it reads the Amazon EC2 resource with read-only credentials, generates the HCL, and produces the exact import block. Two commands take you from a live AWS EBS Volume to managed Terraform.

terraback scan all aws --region us-east-1

terraback aws import --method bulk

The Terraform import block

Terraback emits a Terraform 1.5+ import block like the one below. Because the block lives in your configuration, the import is reviewable in a pull request and repeatable across environments.

import {
  to = aws_ebs_volume.data
  id = "vol-0a1b2c3d4e5f6a7b8"
}

Example aws_ebs_volume configuration

Here is a realistic AWS EBS Volume block. Terraback generates a fuller version from your actual resource attributes; this is a minimal, valid starting point.

resource "aws_ebs_volume" "data" {
  availability_zone = "us-east-1a"
  size              = 100
  type              = "gp3"
  encrypted         = true

  tags = {
    Name = "data-volume"
  }
}

Gotchas when importing a AWS EBS Volume

• The attachment to an EC2 instance is a separate aws_volume_attachment resource and is not imported with the volume.
• iops applies only to io1/io2/gp3 and throughput only to gp3; setting them on the wrong type causes a plan error.
• Volumes attached as a root device of an instance are usually better managed through the instance's root_block_device than as standalone volumes.
• size can only grow, never shrink; a smaller size in config forces replacement and data loss.

Doing it manually with terraform import

The native approach is to write the aws_ebs_volume block by hand, then run terraform import aws_ebs_volume.example <import-id> for every resource, one at a time. That works for a handful of resources, but it does not scale: you author all the HCL yourself and repeat the command for each item. Terraback generates the HCL and the import blocks for your whole account in one pass.

Import other AWS resources