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My first question would be if this EC2 instance or instances are going to be running 24x7. Also are there going to be scaling and therefore increases and decreases in the number of instances you need?
If you have a specific number of instances that will be running 24x7, then looking to Reserved Instances (RI) or Savings Plans (SP) is a good idea.
If you will have an increasing and decreasing number of instances, then purchasing an RI or SP for the baseline number of instances that will be running 24x7 is recommended and paying on-demand for the less frequently used will give you a better return on the cost (bang for your buck).
Now, if we assume that you have 1 or more instances that will be running 24x7 and want to understand the options for RIs and SPs, we can delve into that.
- RIs and EC2 Instance SPs have about the same discount. They apply to a specific region and usually allow for the flexibility to use various instance sizes (large, xlarge, 2xlarge ...) in the same instance family (c5, m5, r5 ...). See the links below for all the details on how RIs and SPs are applied. There are some limitations when using GPU based instances, so you should verify the instance type you are using is not listed in the exclusions.
- Compute Savings Plans offer more flexibility. These can be applied to Lambda, Fargate, any EC2 Instance in any Region. These will give you more coverage and flexibility, but you pay for that flexibility by having a lower discount.
- Finally, both RIs and SPs have similar payment options of All Upfront, Partial Upfront and No Upfront. The Partial and No Upfront options may require some payment history.
And another resource is the Savings Plan FAQ that also covers these topics and more.
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Hi, Thx for the answer, I'm reading the docs, but still, I can't found what modes allow use to change the types, but some of them have the info like the in https://docs.aws.amazon.com/savingsplans/latest/userguide/what-is-savings-plans.html, we can know EC2 Instance Saving can change the instance type, but Compute Saving says nothing about it. IR Instances can change too..., but that is written in other page.. If the type can be changed, is a big point, but.. can know the difference between the plans is hard.... Still there is some clear definitions, like the Spot Instances and On-Demand. But is hard to me understand well the differences like with "EC2 Instance Savings Plans" and "Compute Savings Plans".