Terraform uses persisted state data to keep track of the resources it manages. Most non-trivial Terraform configurations use a backend to store the state remotely. This lets multiple people access the state data and work together on that collection of infrastructure resources. Terraform offers several state storage options, of which env zero supports Remote Backend, which has some great benefits such as:

• No underlying infrastructure setup and management - env zero takes care of the setup as opposed to other approaches, where you need to do all the setup and management yourself (for example, S3 Backend requires you to create an S3 Bucket and an optional DynamoDB Table for locking beforehand).
• Security - env zero stores the state securely and assures only you can access it.
• State consistency - Remote Backends assure that users won’t overwrite each other’s state with a locking mechanism and that they receive the most recent state on every Terraform operation
• Remote plans - By providing the Remote Backend configuration and successful login, users can run terraform plan locally, which will trigger a remote plan in env zero. The remote plan will use the shared state and variables set for the env zero environment.

Using env zero’s Remote Backend has additional advantages:

• No Terraform Backend configuration when running inside env zero - You don’t have to provide any type of configuration; just deploy your code as is, and env zero will automatically configure it to use the Remote Backend.
• States UI - View the current version of your current state and all previous versions.
• Correlation of Deployment to State - easily figure out which deployment is responsible for a specific change to your state (Coming soon).
• State Access Control - Specify which environments should be able to access an environment’s state in env zero.

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Use Remote Backend in a New Environment

Using Remote Backend in your environments is simple:

• Create a new Environment
  • Check the Enable Remote State checkbox
  • Enter a Workspace Name

Here’s what it looks like for environments based on a predefined template: Here’s what it looks like for environments based on a direct VCS integration: That’s it!

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Viewing & Downloading State Versions

After successfully deploying an environment with a Remote Backend, you would have access to the States tab on the environment page. There you should see all the state versions, organized from latest to oldest. To download a state version, simply hover on the desired version. A Download button should appear. Clicking it should initiate a file download. If the state version was created by env zero (i.e., not locally), there would also be a quick access link to its relevant deployment log.

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Force Unlock State

When working with Terraform or OpenTofu, you might encounter a scenario where the state becomes locked. This usually occurs when a previous deployment did not complete successfully—due to an error, crash, or manual interruption. In such cases, the workspace retains a state lock to prevent conflicting changes during concurrent deployments. To resolve this issue, you can manually force unlock the state. This action clears the lock, allowing you to re-run your deployment safely.

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How to Force Unlock

• Navigate to the STATES tab for the affected environment.
• If the workspace is locked, you’ll see a warning along with a “Force Unlock” button.
• Click the Force Unlock button to release the lock

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Using the Remote Backend Locally

Please check out this guide: Using the Remote Backend on your local machine

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Suggested Blog Content

Terraform Modules Guide Terraform Plan Examples Managing Terraform Variable Hierarchy Manage Terraform Remote State with a Remote Backend