A reference snapshot selection technique is configured to select a reference snapshot resolution algorithm used to determine an appropriate reference snapshot that may be employed to perform incremental snapshot replication of workload data between primary and secondary sites in a data replication environment. A reference resolution procedure is configured to process a set of constraints from the data replication environment to dynamically select the reference snapshot resolution algorithm based on a figure of merit that satisfies administrative constraints to reduce or optimize resource utilization in the data replication environment.