One way to reduce cloud provisioning costs on Amazon Web Services (AWS) is by using spot instances. Spot instances are spare compute capacity on AWS that is available at a discounted price. By using spot instances, you can access the same types of EC2 instances as on-demand instances, but at a lower cost.
Here are some tips for using spot instances to reduce your AWS cloud provisioning costs, along with an example to illustrate each point:
- Use spot instances for workloads that are flexible and can be interrupted without impacting your business. Examples of such workloads include batch processing, data analysis, and other non-critical applications.
For example, suppose you have a batch processing job that processes log files and generates reports. This job can run for several hours and does not need to be completed immediately. Instead of using on-demand instances, which are more expensive, you can use spot instances to run the job and save money on your AWS bill.
- Monitor the spot instance market and bid on instances that are available at a price that meets your budget. You can use the AWS Management Console or the AWS Spot Fleet API to manage your bids and monitor the spot instance market.
For example, suppose you want to use spot instances for a long-running data analysis job. You can use the AWS Management Console to monitor the spot instance market and bid on instances that are available at a price that meets your budget. You can set a maximum bid price and the number of instances you want, and AWS will automatically launch instances for you if they are available at or below your maximum bid price.
- Use spot instance pools to manage your spot instances and ensure that you have a consistent supply of compute capacity. Spot instance pools allow you to specify the desired number and type of instances, as well as the maximum price you are willing to pay.
For example, suppose you want to use spot instances for a web application that needs to be highly available. You can use spot instance pools to ensure that you have a consistent supply of compute capacity. You can specify the number and type of instances you want, as well as the maximum price you are willing to pay, and AWS will automatically launch and terminate instances for you based on the availability and price of spot instances in the market.
- Use spot instance termination notifications to be notified when a spot instance is about to be terminated. This allows you to save any in-progress work and gracefully shut down the instance.
For example, suppose you are using spot instances for a long-running data analysis job. You can use spot instance termination notifications to be notified when an instance is about to be terminated, so that you can save any in-progress work and gracefully shut down the instance. This helps to ensure that your data analysis job is not interrupted and that you can continue processing data without losing any work.
Generally, using spot instances on AWS can help you reduce your cloud provisioning costs by taking advantage of spare compute capacity at discounted prices. By carefully managing your spot instances and using them for appropriate workloads, you can save money on your AWS cloud bill.