Instances›AWS EC2›c5›c5.xlarge
Compute
vCPUs4
Memory8 GiB
Mem / vCPU2.00 GiB
ProcessorXeon Platinum 8124M
Clock speed3.4 GHz
Architecturex86_64
Storage
TypeEBS only
Bandwidth4,750 Mbps
Throughput593.75 MB/s
IOPS20,000
Networking
PerformanceUp to 10 Gigabit
Max ENIs4
IPv6Yes
GPUNone
Family sizes
c5.large2 vCPU · 4 GiB
c5.xlarge4 vCPU · 8 GiB
c5.2xlarge8 vCPU · 16 GiB
c5.4xlarge16 vCPU · 32 GiB
c5.9xlarge36 vCPU · 72 GiB
c5.12xlarge48 vCPU · 96 GiB
c5.18xlarge72 vCPU · 144 GiB
c5.24xlarge96 vCPU · 192 GiB
c5.metal96 vCPU · 192 GiB
c5.xlarge

c5.xlarge is AWS's compute-optimized EC2 size at 4 vCPU and 8 GiB. In the name, "c" stands for compute, "5" is the generation and "xlarge" is the size within the c5 family. It runs on Intel Xeon Platinum 8124M at 3.4 GHz, and AWS introduced it in November 2017. AWS has since shipped c6i, c7i, c8i and c9g; c6i.xlarge is the direct replacement at this size. On Rackspace Spot the same shape is ch.vs1.large — 4 vCPU, 8 GiB, matched on both dimensions, about 88% below the US East (N. Virginia) on-demand rate.

Pricing by region
1 hr
RegionAWS on-demandAWS Spot1-yr Reserved3-yr ReservedRackspace SpotYou save
US East, N. Virginia$0.170$0.068$0.107$0.071$0.021
$0.149 savings
US Central, Chicagono AWS region$0.011
US Central, Dallasno AWS region$0.021
Hong Kong$0.216$0.136$0.093$0.036
$0.180 savings
Sydney, Australia$0.222$0.087$0.140$0.096$0.011
$0.211 savings
London, UK$0.202$0.077$0.127$0.087$0.026
$0.176 savings
US West, San Jose$0.212$0.069$0.134$0.092$0.031
$0.181 savings
US Central, Dallas 2no AWS region$0.041
US East, N. Virginia 2$0.170$0.068$0.107$0.071$0.031
$0.139 savings
When to use it
Good for
  • ●Game servers and matchmaking
  • ●Batch processing and CI/CD runners
  • ●Video encoding and transcoding
  • ●Workloads that fit inside 8 GiB of RAM
  • ●Small, steady services that do not need more than 4 vCPU
  • ●Network-heavy services — AWS rates this size at Up to 10 Gigabit
Avoid if
  • ●Starting a new deployment. c6i.xlarge is the newer generation at this size.
  • ●The working set needs more than 8 GiB of RAM
  • ●More than 2.00 GiB of RAM per vCPU is needed — that ratio is fixed for the whole family
  • ●Local NVMe or instance-store disk is a hard requirement
  • ●GPU or FPGA acceleration is needed
  • ●Memory-hungry applications. A memory-optimized family gives more RAM per dollar.
$124/mo on AWS on-demand against $15/mo on Rackspace Spot for the equivalent — market-priced, not list-priced.
  • Spot sells spare capacity at market prices. It is the cheapest compute on the internet.
  • Prices are set by supply and demand. You pay what the market decides.
  • Compute is delivered as fully managed Kubernetes. All infrastructure is taken care of.
  • Egress costs $0.01/GB after the free allowance. AWS charges $0.09/GB.
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