Database Creation

After deploying your Redis cluster, the next step is to create and configure your database. This guide walks through each key area—from minimal setup and optional module selection to configuring memory limits, replication, persistence, and eviction policies.

You’ll also cover security settings like authentication and TLS, set up backups if needed, and explore advanced options like clustering, shard placement, and proxy behavior.

By the end, you’ll have a Redis database configured for your performance, availability, and security needs.

Before You Begin

Before proceeding with database creation, make sure you have completed the following setup tasks:

• FQDN name decided

• Redis cluster fully created and deployed

• DNS or load balancer configured

If these aren't complete, return to DNS Setup for Redis Cluster Access.

Core Configuration Settings

Single-Region Minimal Database Configuration

Basic deployment configuration for a single-region setup. Good for initial testing or lightweight production workloads.

Capabilities / Modules (version-specific)

Redis 8 Databases
Beginning with Redis 8, capabilities are built-in and automatically enabled according to the database type:

• RAM-only: Search & Query, JSON, Time Series, Probabilistic

• Flash-enabled (Flex): JSON, Probabilistic

• Active-Active: Search & Query, JSON

You don't select modules during creation for Redis 8 databases. Capability behavior can be configured later through the database configuration or REST API.

See the Redis 8.0.2-17 Release Notes for details.

Earlier Versions (≤7.8–7.22 / ≤7.4)

• Continue to choose modules such as Redis Search, RedisJSON, RedisBloom, and RedisTimeSeries when creating the database.

• Enabling additional modules later still requires a database re-create or migration.

Note on Flex (Flash) in Redis 8

The Flex engine in Redis 8 offloads least-used keys and values to flash storage, removing previous minimum-RAM constraints and improving hot-set locality.
Databases created or upgraded on Redis 8.2+ automatically use the revamped Flex engine; older databases (≤7.4) continue using the legacy version.
See the Redis 8.0.2-17 Release Notes for more details.

Memory Limit

• Without High Availability: 

  • Memory Limit = Expected data size

• With High Availability: 

  • Memory Limit = 2 × Expected data size

Replication

• Adds High Availability by replicating data across nodes.

• Works with rack zone awareness to increase fault tolerance.

• Recommended: Enable replication.                                                                                                             

Data Persistence

• Ensures data durability by writing to disk (disabled by default).

• Trade-off: Slight performance impact.

• Options: None / Snapshots / AOF

• Recommended options:

  • AOF every 1 second – Best for data durability and minimal loss in failure scenarios

  • Snapshot – Lighter impact, suitable for less critical data

      
  

Security & Authentication

Password & Access Control

• Options: Unauthenticated / Password-only / ACL

• Recommended: Enable Password or ACL for secure access control.
  
  

Transport Layer Security (TLS)

Encrypts data in transit between apps and Redis databases, and also secures communication between Redis Software nodes. TLS can be enabled for client-to-database connections, inter-cluster replication (Replica Of), and Active-Active synchronization.

You can configure supported TLS protocols and ciphers to align with your organization’s security policies. Defaults follow industry best practices but are fully customizable. 

1. From your database's Security tab, select Edit.

2. In the TLS - Transport Layer Security for secure connections section, make sure the checkbox is selected.

3. In the Apply TLS for section, select Clients and databases + Between databases.

4. Select Save.
   
   
   Learn more about Enabling TLS here. 
   
   

Backups and Restore

Periodic Backups

• Schedule backups every 1h, 4h, 12h, or 24h.

• Backup to: FTP, SFTP, local mount, S3, GCS, Azure Blob.

• Checklist:

  • Correct permissions

  • Redis user authorized

  • Credentials verified

• Recommended: Enable

Learn more about Periodic Backups here

Advanced Configuration Options

(Enable these for more complex or large-scale use cases)

Enable Clustering

• Recommended for datasets > 25 GB

• Enables shard-based scaling

Shard Placement Policy

• Dense: Fewer nodes, more shards per node

• Sparse: Distributes shards widely for resilience

Database Proxy Policy

• Configures number/location of proxies that manage traffic
  
  

OSS Cluster API

• An application must be connected using a client that is “cluster-aware”

• You'll face “moved” errors if connecting without a cluster-aware client.

Data Eviction Policy

Eviction policies control what happens when your database reaches its memory limit. To make room for new data, existing keys are removed based on the selected policy.

• Choose a policy that aligns with your data retention strategy.

• To avoid eviction entirely, size your database to hold all required keys.

  Eviction Policy Options

  • noeviction – New values are rejected once memory is full.
    Note: When replication is enabled, this applies only to the primary database.

  • allkeys-lru – Removes the least recently used keys from the entire dataset.

  • allkeys-lfu – Removes the least frequently used keys from the entire dataset.

  • allkeys-random – Removes random keys from the entire dataset.

  • volatile-lru – Removes the least recently used keys, but only among those that have an expiration (TTL) set.

  • volatile-lfu – Removes the least frequently used keys, but only among those that have an expiration (TTL) set.

  • volatile-random – Removes random keys, but only from keys with an expiration set.

  • volatile-ttl – Removes keys with an expiration, starting with those that have the shortest time-to-live (TTL) remaining.

   

Onboarding Progress

Previous: Security Considerations
Next: Connecting to Your Database

Return to the Redis Software Onboarding Overview to view all steps.