AWS Load balancer

Hello.

If the load on a website is due to user access, etc., it is a meaningful configuration because it is possible to distribute the load by introducing an ALB and running multiple web servers behind the ALB.
If the EC2 specs are insufficient due to heavy application processing, rather than the load caused by user access, placing an ALB will not improve the problem.
https://docs.aws.amazon.com/elasticloadbalancing/latest/application/introduction.html

So, first of all, you need to find out the reason why the website is down.
Check the number of website accesses and error details from the web server's access log and error log, and determine if there is any difference from normal times or if the number of accesses is increasing.

1. Assess Traffic Patterns

Traffic Spikes: If your websites experience periodic spikes in traffic that overload the servers, a Load Balancer can help distribute this traffic across multiple servers (instances) to handle the load more effectively. Server Overload: If server logs show that CPU, memory, or bandwidth usage spikes during peak times, this is a sign that a Load Balancer could help by spreading traffic evenly.

2. What a Load Balancer Can Do for You

Distribute Traffic: It balances incoming traffic across multiple backend servers (EC2 instances, containers, or Lambda functions), ensuring no single server is overwhelmed.

Improved Availability: If one server fails, the Load Balancer will route traffic to healthy servers, reducing downtime.

Autoscaling: In AWS, Load Balancers integrate with Auto Scaling, which can automatically add more servers when traffic increases, and remove them during low traffic to save costs.

Types of AWS Load Balancers

Depending on your specific needs, AWS offers different types of Load Balancers:

Application Load Balancer (ALB): Best for HTTP/HTTPS traffic and supports routing based on specific requests (e.g., route traffic to different sites or URLs)

Network Load Balancer (NLB): Ideal for handling very high volumes of TCP traffic and low-latency requirements.

4. Next Steps to Evaluate

Check Instance Metrics: Look at CPU utilization, memory, and network traffic in AWS CloudWatch to identify if your servers are consistently hitting high usage during traffic spikes.

Health Checks: Use a Load Balancer to periodically check the health of your instances, automatically rerouting traffic if one becomes unhealthy. Testing in a Staging Environment: Set up a Load Balancer for a test environment to see how it manages under load.

5. Consulting AWS Trusted Advisor

You can use AWS Trusted Advisor (available with AWS Support Plans) to give you insights into over-utilized resources or suggestions on how to optimize your architecture.

A Load Balancer is likely a good solution for managing traffic spikes, but you may also need to ensure other aspects of your infrastructure, like instance size, Auto Scaling, or caching, are properly configured.