CODEWITHSUNDEEP
performanceamazon-web-servicesamazon-s3amazon-ebs
randomDNA
randomDNA

Reputation: 107

How much faster is EBS than S3?

I have been looking but haven't found the answer to this simple question: In general, how must faster is AWS EBS than S3?

I'm looking for a general ballpark answer in terms of "X times faster", "Y orders of magnitude faster", or a range of "somewhere # to # times faster depending on the specific use case". I'll even take answers that give different use cases as long as there's actual relative performance NUMBERS associated with them.

And PLEASE, I do NOT want this thread to devolve into an architectural discussion of various other solutions I might try (e.g., DynamoDB, ElastiCache, RDS, etc) or the limitations imposed by whatever compute solution I choose (e.g. EC2, Lambda, ECS, etc). Nor do I find "why would you want to do that?" counter-questions helpful no matter how often they appear on StackOverflow.

I'm just looking for "How much faster is EBS than S3?" because I haven't the slightest clue about it right now and haven't found a resource that gives me the type of answer I'm looking for.

Yes, yes, I know the real answer HAS to be "it depends" because determining the answer is infinitely more nuanced than my question.

I know that generally EBS is faster and that how much faster will depend on all sorts of things, like drive type, PIOPs, network speed, etc. all related to a specific use case. But surely there's a general rule of thumb to help choose between the two when evaluating a system's design cost/benefit tradeoffs. ("No there isn't, and stop calling me Shirley.")

If you need to know why I'm asking, let's say I'm just curious what the general speed difference is in case I ever want to decide between them when standing up a cheap-as-heck web site with a dirt-simple data store that is either on EBS or S3. (Again, I'm NOT looking for design options).

Thanks

Upvotes: 1

Views: 3549

Answers (1)

randomDNA
randomDNA

Reputation: 107

For the edge case where you are storing a file as an immutable data file and need to choose between S3 object store and EBS-based file system, both are valid options if you stretch your definition of validity.

To answer the question: EBS is faster (20x?) than S3, but more expensive and bound to a single EC2 instance. S3 is slower but cheaper & more widely accessible to multiple resources. S3 can be made to be much faster with some additional components (See @Mark B's comments above for more details)

You (and I) will want to use S3.

Additional Info For immutable data files, S3 makes more sense in all normal cases: it's fast enough, cheaper, durable, and its contents are more available to multiple parallel processes, making it better for HA solutions.

EBS could make sense if you are hyper sensitive to speed (and can't achieve the speeds with S3+other components) and not cost or high availability. EBS (or it's LAN-like equivalent EFS) is the only choice (out of the 2 being explored) if your file is going to be frequently updated (e.g., random access files for an RDBMS) or used by an application that requires a file system be in place.

(Thanks @Mark B for your patience, and @Jarmod for the objective data)

Upvotes: 4

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