Amazon EC2

Previous Generation Instances

Why Previous Generation Instances?

AWS offers Previous Generation Instances for users who have optimized their applications around these instances and have yet to upgrade. Previous Generation Instances are still fully supported and retain the same features and functionality. Previous Generation Instances are available through the AWS Management Console, AWS CLI, and EC2 API tools.

                                                

Upgrade paths

We encourage you to use the latest generation of instances to get the best performance, but we will continue to support Previous Generation Instances after new instances launch If you are currently using a Previous Generation Instance and would like to see which one would be a suitable upgrade, see the table below and learn how the latest generation of instances could benefit you.

Instances Family       Upgrade Paths  
  • No Newer generation processors Yes Yes Yes
    No Built using the AWS Nitro System Yes Yes Yes
    Very Low Network performance 5 Gbps 5 Gbps 5 Gbps
    No Availability of larger sizes Yes Yes Yes
  • No Latest Processor
    		 Yes Yes Yes
    No Build using the AWS Nitro System
    		 Yes Yes Yes
    High Network Performance 50 Gbps 30 Gbps 50 Gbps
    No Enhanced Networking Yes Yes Yes
  • No Latest Processor
    		 Yes Yes Yes
    No Build using the AWS Nitro System
    		 Yes Yes Yes
    High Network Performance 50 Gbps 30 Gbps 50 Gbps
    No Enhanced Networking Yes Yes Yes
    Yes SSD Storage No No No

  • Compared to I2 instances, I3 instances have over 4x higher I/O performance, over 2x higher disk throughput and 18% more SSD per CPU. I3 instances offer Non-Volatile Memory Express (NVMe) based SSDs offering lower disk latencies than I2. I3 offers the lowest price per read IOPS of all EC2 instances.

    I2   I3
    No Newer Intel Xeon Processors Yes
    Good Storage per instance Better
    No High Performance NVMe Instance Storage Yes
    No ENA Support Yes
    No Larger size (16.xlarge) with up to 15.2 TB of Storage Yes
    Good Price per GB of Instance Storage Better
    Good Price per IOPS Best

  • The R4 family of instances provide a newer Intel Xeon processor, up to 488 GiB of RAM, are EBS optimized by default and support for Enhanced Networking with up to 25 Gbps offering lower latency, and low jitter. Plus, R4 provides a lower price point per GiB of RAM compared to the previous generation instances.

    M2/CR1 R3   R4
    No No Newer Intel Xeon Processors Yes
    No Yes Enhanced Networking Yes
    CR1 only Yes SSD-backed instance storage No (EBS optimized by default)
    Good Better Sustained memory bandwidth Best
    Good Better I/O performance Best
    Good Better Memory per instance Best
    Good Better Price point per GiB of RAM Best

  • Powered by Xeon E5-2676 v3 (Haswell) processors, D2 instances offer more compute power and higher clock frequency, more than twice the memory, EC2 Enhanced Networking, and more storage options than compared to HS1 instances. The largest D2 instance, d2.8xlarge, offers up to 48 TB of instance storage and can deliver up to 3.5 GBps read and 3.1 GBps write disk throughput with a 2 MiB block size. D2 offers the lowest price per disk throughput of all Amazon EC2 instances.