Terraform State file Terraform keeps the remote state of the infrastructure It stores it in a file called terraform.tfstate There is also a backup of the previous state in terraform.tfstate.backup When you execute terraform apply , a new terraform.tfstate and backup is created This is how Terraform keeps track of the remote state If the remote state changes and you run terraform apply again, Terraform will make changes to meet the correct remote state again. E.g., you manually terminate an instance that is managed by Terraform, after you run terraform apply , it will be started again. You can keep the terraform.tfstate in version control (e.g., git ). This will give you a history of your terraform.tfstate file (which is just a big JSON file) This allows you to collaborate with other team members (however, you can get conflicts when two or ...