S3 Storage Classes

Various types of storage classes are available with different pricing options depending upon durability and availability for storing in AWS S3.

1) AWS Standard S3

• 99.999999999% durability
• 99.99 availability
• Highest Pricing 

2) AWS Standard Infrequent Access – IA

• Same durability as standard S3
• 99.90% availability
• Pricing lower than standard S3

3) Intelligent Tiering

• Automatically change storage class so that cost can be optimized.
• Monitor the access of data and automatically move un-accessed data to infrequent tier.

If an object is not accessed for 30 days, then that object will be placed in Standard IA (infrequent access) tier. If any object from IA tier is accessed, then it will be moved back to standard S3 class.

Intelligent Tiering is used if data access patterns are unpredictable or undetermined.

• 1 TB in Standard S3 = 22.88$
• 1 TB in Standard IA = 12.5$

(No need to remember the exact price values for exam. But you need to know which class is costly and which one is cheaper)

4) One Zone IA

Storage classes like standard s3, standard IA will store data in minimum of 3 availability zones. This causes increment in overall cost. One zone IA will store only in one availability zone.

• Cost is 20% less than standard S3.
• Good for storing secondary back ups or any other easily re-creatable data.
• Data will be lost if AZ is destroyed.

5) Reduced Redundancy Storage (RRS)

• Store non critical, reproducible data at lower levels of redundancy than S3 standard.
• 99.99% durability & 99.99% availability

There are 2 more important archiving storage classes discussed in the next post.