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Suspend and resume

how-to · Reviewed 2026-07-30 · FEAT-0036 · FEAT-0037 GA

Suspending powers down the machine but keeps its disk, so software, settings, and files all persist. Resuming takes under 3 minutes, against 15-25 for a fresh launch. If you will use a workstation again, suspend it rather than stopping it.

When to suspend​

Any time you plan to come back. Typical cases:

  • Going home for the day but continuing tomorrow.
  • Keeping a standard pre/post-processing setup you use regularly.

Suspend instead of stopping. Stopping destroys the disk, so returning means a full 15–25 minute rebuild and reconfiguring everything.

Suspend​

Use Suspend Workstation from the top action icons or the right-hand action menu. A confirmation drawer names the workstation.

What happens:

  • No data is lost — the disk is preserved.
  • Compute and workstation-license charges stop.
  • The platform license keeps accruing. Suspending is cheap, not free.
  • Running applications are halted. Save your work in the application first.

The state becomes Suspending; cluster shutdown takes about 5 minutes.

Walltime pauses while suspended and continues when you resume. You can extend it from the Workstations page.

Save important work to Rescale Files before suspending

Suspending releases your hardware back to the cloud provider. Resuming requests it again and is subject to exactly the same capacity limits as a new launch, and it must resume in the same region, so it has fewer options than a fresh launch does.

If you're on a capacity-constrained coretype, you may not get it back for some time. The disk is safe, but you can't reach it until capacity frees up. Anything you'd hate to wait on should be in Rescale Files before you suspend.

Resume​

Click Resume. Compute billing restarts.

Expect under 3 minutes, that figure is for resuming only, not a first-time start, which includes OS and software installation. Everything you saved is restored.

Resuming "in a degraded state"

If you see "The workstation is resuming in a degraded state," the file-sync service isn't running. Changes to attached files won't sync back to Rescale Files.

  • Not using file or job attachments? You can keep working normally.
  • Using attachments? Save your work and stop the workstation, then continue on a new one.

Suspending and resuming again may clear it. If the message is gone, sync is working. Output files from the work directory still sync when the workstation stops, either way.

Autosuspend​

Autosuspend suspends the workstation automatically once a time limit you set is reached, so an idle session doesn't run all night.

Classic UISet the autosuspend limit in hours alongside the hardware settings.

There's no cap on how many times it can trigger, and each time it does, 4 hours are added to the limit. You can change the limit at any time.

Which hardware can be suspended​

Suspension is single-node only. A multi-node workstation cannot be suspended at all.

For single-node, most coretypes qualify. Ineligible ones show a prompt rather than an error:

Classic UICheck eligibility before launching if you intend to suspend.

Two limits worth knowing, because they're not arbitrary:

  • 100 GiB per core of storage. Rescale pays to keep your disk while you're suspended, so very large disks are excluded.
  • No ephemeral storage. Ephemeral volumes lose their contents when a VM moves to a different physical host — which is exactly what suspension does. Eligible coretypes use persistent disks instead.

You cannot change hardware when suspending (for example Citrine 8 → Citrine 32 cores). That's planned but not available today.

Viewing suspension stats​

Click the workstation's name to open its detail page.

Classic UIActive Time is billed for compute; Suspended Time is not.

The logs show status changes and core-hour summaries:

Classic UI

Stopping a suspended workstation​

Stop on a suspended workstation terminates the cluster without saving files.

Classic UI
Stop discards the disk

Anything not already synced to Rescale Files is gone. Resume first and sync if you need it: see saving and syncing files.

Shared users can't suspend or resume​

Someone you've shared a workstation with cannot suspend or resume it. That control stays with you, so a collaborator can't suspend a session out from under you.

Admin auto-termination​

Your workspace admin may set a policy that terminates workstations suspended beyond a set number of days.

  • The suspension clock resets each time you resume.
  • Exceeding the limit means termination, and unsaved data is lost.
  • Admins can configure warning emails ahead of it — you'll typically get notice.
  • Policy changes apply retroactively to already-suspended workstations. If the limit is removed, currently suspended workstations stop being scheduled for termination.

See Administration for the admin side.

If you run out of credits​

A suspended workstation is terminated, and anything not synced to Rescale Files is lost. Suspension does not protect a workstation from a funding lapse.