Switching from S3 remote backend to local state file in Terraform development

Backend
1

I’m working on a Terraform project that uses S3 as the remote backend for our production pipeline. The configuration looks like this:

terraform {
  backend "s3" {
    bucket = "my-terraform-state"
    key    = "infrastructure/terraform.tfstate"
    region = "us-west-2"
  }
}

For local development and testing, I need to use a local state file instead of the remote S3 backend. I tried using terraform init -backend=false but this doesn’t create any backend at all. I also looked into terraform init -backend-config=<file> but I’m not sure what configuration should go in that file for local development.

What’s the best approach to temporarily switch from remote S3 backend to local state management during development? Should I create a separate backend configuration file or is there a simpler way to handle this scenario?

2

Interesting problem! Terraform workspaces might work for this. But I’m curious - how do you merge state changes when switching back to S3 after local dev? That sounds like it could get messy fast. What resources are you testing locally that need local state?

3

just comment out the backend block in your terraform config when ur developing. terraform defaults to local state automatically. once ur done testing, uncomment it and run terraform init again - it’ll migrate back to s3. way easier than dealing with backend config files.

4

I’ve had good luck managing this with workspace configs instead of switching backends completely. Make a backend-local.hcl file with empty config, then run terraform init -backend-config=backend-local.hcl -reconfigure. This forces a reinit with local state. Just heads up - you’ll lose remote state access while developing locally. Better long-term fix is using workspaces or separate directories for dev environments. I usually create a dev/ subdirectory with its own backend config that points to a different S3 bucket or local state. Keep production in the main directory. Prevents state conflicts and makes dev work way more predictable.