How to fix Error creating S3 bucket: BucketAlreadyExists in Terraform

First, confirm the bucket name is actually taken:

aws s3api head-bucket --bucket my-bucket-name --region us-east-1

If this returns without error (HTTP 200), the bucket exists. If it returns 404, the bucket is available but cached. If it returns 403, the bucket exists but you lack permissions.

If you own the bucket and want Terraform to manage it:

terraform import aws_s3_bucket.my_bucket my-bucket-name

Replace "my_bucket" with your resource name and "my-bucket-name" with the actual bucket name. This updates your state file without modifying the bucket.

Let Terraform generate a unique suffix by using bucket_prefix instead of bucket:

resource "aws_s3_bucket" "my_bucket" {
  bucket_prefix = "my-app-"
}

Terraform will create a bucket like "my-app-a1b2c3d4e5f6". AWS appends 8 random characters to ensure uniqueness.

Make the bucket name globally unique by including your AWS account ID or a random identifier:

data "aws_caller_identity" "current" {}

resource "aws_s3_bucket" "my_bucket" {
  bucket = "my-app-${data.aws_caller_identity.current.account_id}"
}

This ensures each AWS account gets a unique bucket name.

List resources in your state to see if the bucket is already tracked:

terraform state list | grep s3_bucket
terraform state show aws_s3_bucket.my_bucket

If the resource exists in state, remove it and re-import:

terraform state rm aws_s3_bucket.my_bucket
terraform import aws_s3_bucket.my_bucket my-bucket-name

If the bucket is orphaned and you want to start fresh:

# First, remove all objects
aws s3 rm s3://my-bucket-name --recursive

# Then delete the bucket
aws s3 rb s3://my-bucket-name

# Now run Terraform apply
terraform apply

Be cautious - this permanently deletes all bucket contents!