AWS EBS vs EFS vs S3

Amazon web services are widely used around the world for storage options. However, choosing a storage option is not easy since each of them has unique features and costs.

So, in this article, I will discuss AWS EBS, EFS, and S3 with their features, usability, and cost.

What is AWS EBS?

AWS EBS (Elastic block service) is a network drive that allows you to attach to a single EC2 instances.

You can preserve the EC2 data using EBS when the instance is terminated. Also, EBS can be easily attached and from one EC2 and attach to another EC2.

EBS volumes are only available for the availability zone it was created and can only be mounted to a single EC2 instance at a time.

If you need to move an EBS volume to another availability zone, you need to take a snapshot.

Features of EBS

• Provides different volume options for your needs — General purpose SSD, Provisioned IOPS SSD, Hard disk drives.
• EBS handles encryption for you.
• High availability.
• Provides RAID options to increase availability and performance.
• Easy to create snapshots and backups.
• Easy to scale.

When should we use EBS?

EBS should always be used with EC2 instances so, if you are looking for a storage option with high availability and high performance for a single EC2 instance, EBS the perfect solution.

Cost of using AWS EBS

• Free Tier — 30 GB storage, 2M I/O operations, 1Gb snapshot storage.
• General Purpose SSD (gp2) — 0.10 USD per GB-month.
• Provisioned IOPS SSD (io1) 0.125 USD per GB-month.
• Throughput Optimized HDD (st1) 0.045 USD per GB-month.
• Cold HDD (sc1) volumes 0.025 USD per GB-month.

What is AWS EFS?

EFS (Elastic file system) is a network file system that can be mounted into multiple EC2 instances.

As the name implies, it is a file storage system. It works similarly to your computer hard drive and allows fast read and write operations.

Unlike EBS, EFS can be used across multiple availability zones and charges based on usage.

The most highlighted feature of EFS is its auto scalability. It allows your application to function even when the number of files increases.

Features of EFS

• Automatic scalability.
• It can be used with multiple EC2 instances and across availability zones.
• High throughput supports heavy workloads.
• It is a complete managed service.

When should we use EFS?

With its auto-scaling feature, EFSs are suitable for content management systems perfectly. Also, if you need to use the same storage in multiple EC2 instances, EFS is the go-to option.

Cost of Using AWS EFS

• Free Tier — 5 GB storage for 12 months.
• Standard Storage — 0.30 USD GB-month.

What is AWS S3

S3 (simple storage service) is the most used storage type in AWS. Unlike EBS and EFS, S3 is not bound to EC2 instances.

S3 organizes data in a hierarchy with metadata and it allows to run more complex queries on objects compared to EBS and EFS.

Since most of you are familiar with S3, I will not talk about it in detail. So let’s see some of its features.

Features of S3

• Provides static site hosting.
• Not bound to EC2 instances.
• Can access using programmatic access keys.
• Highly available and flexible.
• Cost-effective.

When should we use S3?

Well, we can’t specify this suitability of S3 for one or two occasions. It is already used worldwide by developers for various purposes like storing web application data, mobile application data, and even static site hosting.

Cost of Using AWS S3

• Free Tier — 5 GB storage, 20000 Get Requests, 2000 Put Requests.
• S3 Standard — First 50 TB-Month 0.023 USD, next 450 TB-Month 0.022 USD, over 500 TB-Month 0.021 USD.

EBS vs. EFS vs. S3

To better understand the differences and similarities between these 3, I have created an infographic comparison summarizing everything discussed in the article.

Conclusion

In this article, I highlighted the similarities and differences between EBS, EFS, and S3 storage. Therefore, I hope you will choose the most suitable storage for your purpose and reduce the cost with what you learned in this article.

Thank you for Reading !!!

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