What is AWS EC2?
Tags: cloudcomputing, aws, ec2, devops
Published: 2023-08-04 05:03:27

**AWS EC2 Basics — I**

Do you know that you can build a straightforward full-stack web application utilizing a few AWS services, a collection of tools, and a web hosting service? Yes, you can, but first, you need familiarize yourself with several fundamental cloud services, such as AWS EC2, S3, VPC, and IAM (Identity & Access Management).

So let’s start with AWS EC2.


![Amazon EC2](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/n5eo5s6ooijrf5dixc0x.png)

## What is AWS EC2?

Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) is one of the main components of [cloud infrastructure](https://nioyatech.com/beginners-guide-to-cloud-infrastructure-management/) in Amazon Web Services (AWS).

EC2 offers scalable computing power. You can create and deploy apps more quickly by using Amazon EC2 since you won't need to make an upfront hardware investment.

You may construct servers soon in order to start your websites or apps using the EC2 (Elastic Cloud Compute) service. They are referred to as "instances" by AWS.


## AWS Instance Types
You can choose from a variety of instance types on Amazon EC2 to get the CPU, memory, storage, and networking resources you require to execute your applications. The hardware of the host computer utilized for your instance depends on the instance type you pick when you launch it.

Each instance type has unique computation, memory, and storage capabilities, and these features are used to classify each instance type into an instance family.

**General purpose instances**
On general purpose instances, which evenly distribute computation, memory, and networking resources, a range of workloads may be executed. "T" and "M" are the two different categories of general-purpose instances.

**Compute optimized instances**
Applications that require high levels of processing efficiency should use instances that are optimized for computation. These have "C" letter names like C5, C5a, C5ad, C5d, and C5n.

**Memory optimized instances**
Instances with memory optimization are made to provide quick performance for workloads that process big amounts of data in memory. “R” and “X” types are memory optimized instances.

**Storage optimized instances**
Storage-optimized instances are developed for applications that demand regular, sequential read and write access to massive volumes of locally stored data. Their improved performance enables them to offer tens of thousands of random, low-latency I/O operations per second (IOPS) to applications.

Storage-optimized instances come in three different flavors: "H," "I," and "D."

**Accelerated computing instances**
In accelerated computing scenarios, co-processors—also referred to as hardware accelerators—are utilized to do some jobs more quickly than they can be completed by CPU-based software, such as processing graphics, matching data patterns, or completing floating point number calculations.

“P” and “G” types are accelerated computing instances.

## Amazon Machine Image (AMI)
A software configuration, often an operating system, is contained in the template known as an Amazon Machine Image (AMI). When you create an instance, you must choose an AMI.

A decision on EBS storage must be made at some stage during setup. Elastic Block Storage (EBS) is the name of a persistent block level storage volume used with EC2. Every block acts as a hard drive in this scenario.


## AWS EC2 Pricing
Utilizing the AWS Free Tier; you may start using Amazon EC2 without paying anything If you signed up for your AWS account less than a year ago, and have not already exceeded the free tier benefits for Amazon EC2. The following buying options for instances are available through Amazon EC2:

**On-Demand Instances**
Without any long-term obligations or upfront payments, you just pay for the instances that you use, at a rate of one cent per second for a minimum of 60 seconds.

**Savings Plans**
By committing to a constant quantity of consumption, expressed in USD per hour, for a period of 1 or 3 years, you may lower your Amazon EC2 charges.

**Reserved Instances**
By committing to a certain instance configuration, including instance type and Region, for a duration of 1 or 3 years, you may lower your Amazon EC2 charges.

**Spot Instances**
Requesting unused EC2 instances can help you save money.

## Setting up to use Amazon EC2
So far we have learned the basics of AWS EC2. My next article will be about launching an instance, stay tuned.

This post is originally published at [AWS EC2 Basics - 1 ](https://medium.com/@samueldeniz80/aws-ec2-basics-i-87b2d7b23206)