Amazon S3 Intelligent-Tiering: Automate Cost Savings

<h1 id="amazon-s3-intelligent-tiering-the-ultimate-guide-to-cost-savings">Amazon S3 Intelligent-Tiering: The Ultimate Guide to Cost Savings</h1> <p>Amazon S3 Intelligent-Tiering is a cloud storage class that automatically delivers cost savings by moving data between access tiers when access patterns change. It is the perfect solution for data with unknown or changing access patterns.</p> <div class="toc"> <h3>Table of Contents</h3> <ul> <li><a href="#what-is-amazon-s3-intelligent-tiering">What is Amazon S3 Intelligent-Tiering?</a></li> <li><a href="#how-does-s3-intelligent-tiering-work">How Does S3 Intelligent-Tiering Work?</a></li> <li><a href="#benefits-of-using-s3-intelligent-tiering">Benefits of Using S3 Intelligent-Tiering</a></li> <li><a href="#when-to-use-s3-intelligent-tiering">When to Use S3 Intelligent-Tiering</a></li> <li><a href="#example-enabling-intelligent-tiering-with-terraform">Example: Enabling Intelligent-Tiering with Terraform</a></li> <li><a href="#frequently-asked-questions-faq">Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)</a></li> </ul> </div> <h2 id="what-is-amazon-s3-intelligent-tiering">What is Amazon S3 Intelligent-Tiering?</h2> <p>Amazon S3 Intelligent-Tiering is the first cloud storage class that automatically optimizes costs by moving data between access tiers when access patterns change. It delivers automatic cost savings by moving data that hasn't been accessed for 30 consecutive days to the Infrequent Access tier.</p> <h2 id="how-does-s3-intelligent-tiering-work">How Does S3 Intelligent-Tiering Work?</h2> <p>S3 Intelligent-Tiering stores objects in two access tiers:</p> <ul> <li><strong>Frequent Access Tier</strong>: Optimized for frequent access.</li> <li><strong>Infrequent Access Tier</strong>: Optimized for lower costs.</li> </ul> <p>If an object in the Infrequent Access tier is accessed, it is automatically moved back to the Frequent Access tier. No retrieval fees apply when using the S3 Intelligent-Tiering storage class.</p> <h3 id="automatic-tiers">Automatic Tiers</h3> <ul> <li><strong>Frequent Access Tier</strong>: Standard S3 performance.</li> <li><strong>Infrequent Access Tier</strong>: Save 40% on storage costs after 30 days of inactivity.</li> <li><strong>Archive Instant Access Tier</strong>: Save 68% on storage costs after 90 days of inactivity.</li> </ul> <h3 id="optional-asynchronous-archive-capabilities">Optional Asynchronous Archive Capabilities</h3> <p>You can also activate optional archive capabilities for data that can be accessed in minutes or hours:</p> <ul> <li><strong>Archive Access Tier</strong>: For data not accessed for 90 days (configurable).</li> <li><strong>Deep Archive Access Tier</strong>: For data not accessed for 180 days (configurable).</li> </ul> <h2 id="benefits-of-using-s3-intelligent-tiering">Benefits of Using S3 Intelligent-Tiering</h2> <ul> <li><strong>Cost Optimization</strong>: Automatically save up to 40% or more on storage costs.</li> <li><strong>Performance</strong>: Same low latency and high throughput as S3 Standard.</li> <li><strong>Durability</strong>: Designed for 99.999999999% (11 9s) of data durability.</li> <li><strong>No Operational Overhead</strong>: No need to manually move data or analyze access patterns.</li> </ul> <h2 id="when-to-use-s3-intelligent-tiering">When to Use S3 Intelligent-Tiering</h2> <ul> <li><strong>Data Lakes</strong>: Where access patterns are unpredictable.</li> <li><strong>Analytics</strong>: For datasets used in machine learning or analytics.</li> <li><strong>New Applications</strong>: When you don't have historical access data.</li> <li><strong>User-Generated Content</strong>: Photos and videos where access frequency varies.</li> </ul> <h2 id="example-enabling-intelligent-tiering-with-terraform">Example: Enabling Intelligent-Tiering with Terraform</h2> <p>You can enforce Intelligent-Tiering on your S3 buckets using Lifecycle Rules. Here is a Terraform example to transition objects to Intelligent-Tiering (although Intelligent-Tiering is a storage class itself, you often transition <em>to</em> it or set it as default).</p> <p>Below is how to set a Lifecycle Configuration to transition objects to <code>INTELLIGENT_TIERING</code> after 0 days (immediately upon upload if desired, or after a specific period from Standard):</p> <pre><code class="language-hcl">resource "aws_s3_bucket_lifecycle_configuration" "example" { bucket = aws_s3_bucket.example.id rule { id = "TransitionToIntelligentTiering" status = "Enabled" transition { days = 0 storage_class = "INTELLIGENT_TIERING" } } } </code></pre> <h2 id="frequently-asked-questions-faq">Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)</h2> <h3 id="what-is-the-monitoring-fee">What is the monitoring fee?</h3> <p>S3 Intelligent-Tiering charges a small monthly monitoring and automation fee per object.</p> <h3 id="are-there-retrieval-fees">Are there retrieval fees?</h3> <p>No, there are no retrieval fees in S3 Intelligent-Tiering. If you access an object in the Infrequent Access tier, it moves back to Frequent Access.</p> <h3 id="is-there-a-minimum-storage-duration">Is there a minimum storage duration?</h3> <p>There is no minimum storage duration charge, but objects smaller than 128 KB are not eligible for auto-tiering monitoring.</p> <p>For more expert guidance, check out our <a href="/tech/aws-s3">Amazon S3</a>, <a href="/tech/aws-consultancy">AWS Consultancy</a>, and <a href="/tech/kubernetes-consultancy">Kubernetes Consultancy</a> services.</p> <p>Source / Source: <a href="https://awsfundamentals.com/blog/amazon-s3-intelligent-tiering">https://awsfundamentals.com/blog/amazon-s3-intelligent-tiering</a></p>