AWS Spot Price History

by Jing Xie

AWS Spot Price History

AWS spot pricing offers substantial discounts for cost-conscious cloud consumers, yet it comes with its own set of unique concerns. This article breaks down AWS Spot’s dynamic pricing model, exploring its features, advantages, and potential drawbacks.

By analyzing AWS spot pricing history, we will examine past patterns, contrast them with on-demand pricing, and examine best practices for maximizing your spot experience with solutions like MMCloud SpotSurfer.

What is AWS spot pricing?

AWS spot pricing is a dynamic pricing scheme for Amazon EC2 or Elastic Compute Cloud computing instances. The AWS spot pricing scheme gives a significant saving which is up to 90% compared to on-demand pricing. While the on-demand prices have a fixed rate, AWS spot pricing constantly fluctuates based on supply and demand. It is auctioned off to the highest bidder at any given moment.

Amazon EC2 has unused capacity at times. This could be due to various factors, for example, regional variations in demand, fluctuations in workloads, or new infrastructure coming online. This unused capacity is offered as spot instances. The price for each instance type in each availability zone is constantly adjusted based on supply and demand in real time.

When you submit a bid for an instance, this bid competes with other users’ bids for the same instance type. If your bid is the highest at the time, you get the instance. If not, you need to either increase your bid or wait for the price to drop down to your desired level. This price can change every minute, so it’s important to be aware of the historical trends and potential volatility.

EC2 Console Pricing History

The EC2 console pricing history is a visual representation of the past prices for the spot instances. It is a powerful tool that allows you to calculate the cost of your spot instances with past references. With its help, you can uncover trends and patterns in your instances. It is done by identifying seasonal fluctuations, peak pricing periods, and overall price stability for different instance types. You can optimize your bidding strategies by analyzing past bids. You can also plan your spot budget, choose the right instance types, and mitigate cost risks with the help of EC2 console pricing history.

Here’s how you may access the pricing history.

  • Navigate to the EC2 Console and select “Spot Requests.”
  • Go to the “Pricing History” section on the upper menu.
  • Customize the data view using the provided filters and options.

You can gain a comprehensive understanding of your cloud spending and make correct decisions that save the cost with spot instances by using the strength of EC2 console pricing history and other available tools.

Does AWS have spot pricing?

Yes, AWS has spot pricing!

AWS services offer a wide range of pricing models to cater to the various needs and budgets of its users. It includes Amazon EC2 spot pricing, on-demand pricing, reserved instances, saving plans, pay-per-use pricing, etc. The price plan that best suits your demands will rely on your workload, finances, and unique requirements. To ensure you make the right choice, carefully consider your usage habits and price sensitivity.

Are spot instances cheaper?

Spot instances are up to 90% off compared to on-demand pricing, making them much cheaper in many cases. However, the prices can fluctuate drastically, making it difficult to predict your costs.

The pricing of the spot instances depends on several factors. You may forecast future trends, improve your bidding tactics, and eventually reduce your cloud expenses by being aware of these factors. Supply and demand, market dynamics, and infrastructure considerations are some important factors influencing spot prices. Also, there are some additional factors like Amazon’s pricing algorithms and external factors like natural disasters or economic fluctuations which can decide the pricing of the spot instances.

By keeping up to date on these factors and making use of resources like historical price charts, bidding techniques, and the AWS Spot Instance API, you may successfully move through spot pricing and take advantage of its potential cost savings.

Does AWS charge for stopped instances?

No, AWS does not charge for stopped instances for AWS EC2 instances deployed on spot instances. However, on-demand rates will be applied for the following.

  • “Attached EBS volumes.”
  • “Unused elastic IP addresses.”
  • “Minimum billing periods.”

Regarding on-demand pricing, AWS does not levy any charges for instances that are stopped. Once an on-demand instance is halted, all associated costs are suspended until the instance is restarted.

This approach is an effective way to optimize your cloud costs when these instances are not in use. To maximize savings, consider stopping on-demand instances during idle periods, but always ensure to review your specific pricing model to avoid unexpected charges.

Can you stop and start a spot instance?

Yes, you can stop and start a spot instance in AWS. However, depending on whether you’re utilizing the more recent “stop and start” feature or the more conventional “stop” behavior, the procedure and associated expenses vary slightly.

Stop and Start Functionality

  • This capability, which was released in 2020, lets you directly stop (using the ‘start-time’ command) and restart EBS-backed spot instances without interfering with your work on any operating system, including Linux.
  • The state and data are stored on the EBS volume when you terminate the instance (using the ‘end time’ parameter).
  • The instance will then automatically continue from the stored state whenever you choose to restart it using AWS CLI commands.
  • Hibernation is no longer necessary, therefore there is no chance of data loss or additional launch expenses.
  • Nevertheless, this feature is restricted to persistent spot requests that have the fleet option “maintain” set.

Traditional Stop Behavior

  • Spot instances can be stopped via the AWS management console, command line interface (CLI), or SDK.
  • The instance won’t cost anything while it’s stopped, but you will still be charged for attached EBS volumes, unused elastic IP addresses, and minimum billing periods.
  • When the instance is prepared to continue, it will either restart automatically (at the ‘start-time’) or launch a new instance from the AMI using the AWS CLI on a Linux or Windows operating system.

What is the difference between spot pricing and reserved instances?

Spot pricing and reserved instances are two popular pricing models offered by Amazon web services for EC2 instances. Each of them has their advantages and disadvantages. The key differences in both include cost, availability, flexibility, and use cases.

  • Cost: Spot pricing offers significantly lower costs, but price changes can fluctuate significantly based on supply and demand. And the reserved instances provide predictable and discounted rates compared to on-demand pricing.
  • Availability: Amazon EC2 can stop spot pricing instances with a two-minute notice when necessary. Reserved instances guarantee consistent availability in the chosen region throughout the commitment period.
  • Flexibility: Spot instances are widely accessible, so you may simply scale up or down your resources according to your demands. Reserved instances provide a certain amount of freedom. Although you are free to end them at any moment.
  • Use cases: Spot pricing is ideal for flexible workloads that can tolerate interruptions. Reserved instances are suitable for predictable workloads with consistent resource requirements.

The optimal decision between reserved instances and spot pricing ultimately comes down to your specific requirements. Budget, cost sensitivity, workload flexibility, and uptime needs are just a few things to think about.

Spot prices vs on-demand prices: benefits and disadvantages

Choosing between spot and on-demand pricing for your Amazon web services EC2 instances is a major decision that will have a substantial impact on your cloud expenditure. Every model has unique benefits and drawbacks, and the best option will rely on your unique requirements and workload. Let’s examine the benefits and drawbacks of each.

Spot Pricing:
Spot pricing costs are significantly lower compared to on-demand pricing. However, the prices can fluctuate drastically based on supply and demand, making predictability challenging. Also, it can easily scale your resources up or down based on your needs. On the downside, spot instances can be interrupted by Amazon EC2 with a 2-minute warning and it’s not suitable for all workloads.

On-Demand Pricing:
It has a consistent pricing structure, but pricing is significantly higher than spot Instances. It is always available and won’t be interrupted and there is no need to manage bids or worry about interruptions. However, the downside is that scaling resources can be slow and expensive, and it may not utilize resources effectively.

Benefits of Spot Pricing

Cost-conscious cloud users can profit greatly from spot instances on Amazon web Service. They offer substantial cost savings, more flexibility, and potentially positive environmental effects. These benefits include cost saving, flexibility, and sustainability.

What is the advantage of spot instances on Amazon EC2?

Depending on your unique requirements and goals, you may choose the optimum benefit of spot instances on Amazon EC2. These three notable benefits are the ones that could be most beneficial to you.

  • Dramatic Cost Savings

Spot pricing costs lower than on-demand pricing by up to 90%. This is the pinnacle of spot instances. It’s possible to drastically reduce your cloud costs, which makes it an affordable refuge for machine learning training, data analysis, and batch processing.

  • High Scalability

You can easily and rapidly scale your resources up or down with spot instances. Spot instances smoothly scale up to meet the demands of unexpected spikes in workload. You easily scale down when you need to calm down, saving needless resource waste and related expenses.

  • Sustainability

Spot instances help reduce energy use and create a more sustainable cloud footprint by taking advantage of underutilized cloud resources. Also, it encourages the effective use of resources. Paying just for what you use encourages ecologically beneficial computing practices and discourages waste.

Disadvantages of Spot Pricing

Spot pricing on Amazon Web Services offers attractive cost savings and flexibility, but it’s important to be aware of its potential drawbacks before diving in. Price volatility, interruptions, limited use cases, additional costs, and environmental concerns are some of these drawbacks.

  • Price Volatility

Spot prices, including the current spot price, are subject to frequent changes based on supply and demand, unlike the more stable on-demand pricing. This might make it difficult to predict costs, particularly when performing a long-running workload. Consulting the spot instance pricing history and using tools like the Spot Instance Advisor can help mitigate some of these challenges.

  • Limited Use Cases

Certain workloads, particularly those requiring specific allocation strategies and consistent deployments, are not suitable for the risks associated with fluctuating prices and interruptions. For consistent performance and availability, mission-critical applications, web servers, and databases shouldn’t be hosted on spot instances. When planning to use spot instances, it’s crucial to assess if the nature of the task aligns with the flexibility of spot pricing.

  • Additional Costs

Although the interrupted instance itself will not cost you anything, you may be charged for EBS volumes, unused elastic IP addresses, and minimum billing periods, among other resources. Understanding the full spectrum of costs, including those associated with deployments and allocation of resources, is essential when opting to use spot instances.

What happens when AWS chooses your spot instance for termination?

When AWS chooses your spot instance for termination, there will be a specific process and timeline to provide you with enough time to be prepared.

  • Termination Notice: You’ll receive a termination notice two minutes before your instance is terminated.
  • Grace Period: You have 2 minutes to properly close your application and take care of any pending obligations.
  • Instance Termination: Amazon EC2 will immediately end the instance if your application does not finish the required setup within the allotted 2 minutes.

What are spot instances best for?

Spot instances shine in specific situations and are not one-size-fits-all. Here are some use cases where they excel:

  • Batch processing
  • Machine learning training
  • Proof-of-concept projects
  • High-performance computing
  • Rendering workloads
  • Large-scale simulations

However, remember that spot instances have limitations such as price volatility, interruptions, etc.

Optimize AWS Spot Costs

Optimizing your AWS spot expenses requires an effective approach to deploying these extremely flexible yet occasionally variable instances. Here are some techniques to minimize the expenses.

  • Bidding strategies
  • Interruption handling
  • Monitoring and cost management

Note that spot cost optimization is a continuous effort. You can fully utilize these priceless resources while controlling your cloud spending by tracking, evaluating, and modifying your plans.

MMCloud

MMCloud is a powerful and intuitive container orchestration platform for running batch and interactive computing applications on AWS. The platform abstracts away DevOps complexity and makes it easy to safely run workloads EC2 Spot instances, automatically right-size compute resources, and save cloud costs.

MMCloud seamlessly integrates with popular workflow managers like Nextflow and runs in your own AWS account, ensuring data never leaves your IT approved environment, and you are in complete control of your cloud costs.

The solution combines several forms of Cloud automation to deliver cost and devops savings:

  • Job scheduling automation
  • Cloud resource automation
  • Container migration automation
  • Enhanced visibility and control
  • Near-real-time cost management

SpotSurfer (a killer MMCloud feature for EC2 Spot instances)

It is now safe, effective, and easy to run complex data pipelines on EC2 Spot instances, saving upwards of 70-80% on compute costs vs. EC2 On-Demand. If a Spot instance is reclaimed, SpotSurfer automatically checkpoints and migrates the running job to resume on a new EC2 instance versus having to restart from the beginning. Launch long-running batch jobs at night on EC2 Spot and sleep soundly, SpotSurfer is managing it for you.

Summary

Going through cloud computing and its costs and types such as spot pricing can be complex. However, AWS spot pricing offers a unique path to significant savings. Compared to on-demand pricing, these instances can slash costs by up to 90% but require careful consideration due to price volatility and the possibility of disruptions. It can be perfect for flexible activities like batch processing or data analysis. But they aren’t suitable for every workload due to their potential interruptions. However, you can take advantage of spot pricing and maximize its advantages while limiting its drawbacks with the right planning, technologies like spot fleets, and cost monitoring.