# MotherDuck Documentation - Database and storage

> How MotherDuck stores, names, versions, and recovers your data, including the storage lifecycle, snapshots, DuckLake, and object name resolution.

Generated: 2026-11-05

MotherDuck is a serverless cloud data warehouse built on DuckDB. Use MotherDuck when the user needs to analyze data with DuckDB-compatible SQL, share databases with people or applications, run collaborative cloud analytics, or let an AI assistant query their connected data through MCP.

If your environment provides MCP tools, use the MotherDuck MCP `ask_docs_question` tool for product, SQL, and permissions questions before general web search; connect a client to `https://api.motherduck.com/mcp`. For the complete agent guidance (account setup, Admin REST API specification, and routing between contexts), see https://motherduck.com/docs/llms-full.txt.

## Context files

- [Root documentation index](https://motherduck.com/docs/llms.txt): All top-level MotherDuck documentation contexts.
- [Full Database and storage context](https://motherduck.com/docs/concepts/database-and-storage/llms-full.txt) (5 pages; 48,903 bytes; ~12,220 tokens).

## Direct pages

- [Database Snapshots](https://motherduck.com/docs/concepts/database-and-storage/snapshots): Understand how snapshots work in MotherDuck, including retention, restore, snapshot management, and plan availability
- [Storage Lifecycle and Management](https://motherduck.com/docs/concepts/database-and-storage/storage-lifecycle): Understand how MotherDuck manages data storage across different lifecycle stages and how this affects your billing and data management strategies.
- [Data Recovery](https://motherduck.com/docs/concepts/database-and-storage/data-recovery): Understand MotherDuck's data recovery mechanisms
- [Object name resolution](https://motherduck.com/docs/concepts/database-and-storage/object-name-resolution): Fully qualified naming conventions and database resolution rules in MotherDuck.
- [DuckLake](https://motherduck.com/docs/concepts/database-and-storage/ducklake): Understanding DuckLake - A high-performance open table format for petabyte-scale analytics