Economics
Near-zero is expensive
06 / 22

Tighter recovery targets cost disproportionately more.

Going from days to hours is usually automation. Going from minutes to seconds is usually duplicate live infrastructure, faster replication, and harder operations.

Backup & restore

Low cost · slow recovery

Pilot light

Moderate cost · faster data recovery

Warm standby

Higher cost · faster service recovery

Active-active

Highest cost · hardest to operate

Lower RPO means better replication, better backup design, or both.
Lower RTO means less provisioning at disaster time and more ready capacity.
The right answer is the cheapest design that meets the business loss tolerance.