AWS Auto Scaling is a service that automatically scales resources in response to changes in demand, ensuring that you have the right resources available at the right time to handle your application workload.
Auto Scaling can scale your resources both horizontally (adding or removing instances) and vertically (increasing or decreasing the size of instances) based on demand.
Horizontal scaling increases or decreases the number of instances in your Auto Scaling group based on the demand for your application.
For example, during periods of high traffic, Auto Scaling will automatically add more instances to your group to handle the increased load.
Similarly, during periods of low traffic, Auto Scaling will remove instances from your group to reduce costs.
Vertical scaling increases or decreases the size of your instances based on the demand for your application. For example, if your application requires more CPU or memory resources, Auto Scaling can automatically increase the size of your instances to handle the increased workload. Similarly, if the demand for your application decreases, Auto Scaling can decrease the size of your instances to save costs.
The lifecycle of Auto Scaling consists of the following stages:
- Launch: When an instance is launched, it is automatically added to the Auto Scaling group.
- Scale Out: As the demand for your application increases, Auto Scaling will add more instances to your group to handle the increased load.
- Scale In: As the demand for your application decreases, Auto Scaling will remove instances from your group to reduce costs.
- Terminate: When an instance is terminated, it is removed from the Auto Scaling group.
Auto Scaling can be triggered based on a variety of metrics, including CPU usage, network traffic, and application load.
You can configure Auto Scaling to scale based on a single metric or a combination of metrics.
Overall, AWS Auto Scaling is a powerful tool that can help you optimize the performance and cost of your applications by automatically scaling your resources based on demand.
Whether you need to scale horizontally or vertically, Auto Scaling can help ensure that you have the right resources available at the right time to handle your workload.
