Instances›AWS EC2›is4gen›is4gen.4xlarge
Compute
vCPUs16
Memory96 GiB
Mem / vCPU6.00 GiB
ProcessorGraviton2 Processor
Clock speed2.5 GHz
Architecturearm64
Storage
Type2 × 7,500 GB NVMe SSD
Bandwidth10,000 Mbps
Throughput1250 MB/s
IOPS40,000
Networking
Performance25 Gigabit
Max ENIs8
IPv6Yes
GPUNone
Family sizes
is4gen.medium1 vCPU · 6 GiB
is4gen.large2 vCPU · 12 GiB
is4gen.xlarge4 vCPU · 24 GiB
is4gen.2xlarge8 vCPU · 48 GiB
is4gen.4xlarge16 vCPU · 96 GiB
is4gen.8xlarge32 vCPU · 192 GiB
is4gen.4xlarge

The is4gen.4xlarge pairs 16 vCPU with 96 GiB of RAM, the 6.00 GiB-per-vCPU ratio that marks a storage-optimized instance. In the name, "4" is the generation, "gen" marks AWS Graviton (ARM) processors, extended capacity and enhanced networking and "4xlarge" is the size within the is4gen family. It runs on AWS Graviton2 Processor at 2.5 GHz, and AWS introduced it in November 2021. is4gen is the current generation of the is family, so there is no newer AWS size to migrate to. mh.vs1.2xlarge on Rackspace Spot lines up one-for-one: 16 vCPU and 128 GiB, $2.31/hr on AWS in US East (N. Virginia), from $0.021/hr on Rackspace Spot.

Match qualityx86 substitution

is4gen.4xlarge is Graviton (arm64). Rackspace Spot does not have arm64 servers, so mh.vs1.2xlarge is an x86_64 substitute with similar specs.

You will need x86 builds of your container images. Most software rebuilds without changes, but anything with compiled native code needs a real rebuild rather than a retag. Speed per core also differs between the two chips, so it is worth testing before deciding how many nodes to run.

No local diskis4gen.4xlarge comes with 2 × 7,500 GB NVMe SSD attached to the machine. Spot nodes use network storage only, so that disk doesn't come with it. If you were using it as fast scratch space, you'd move to a persistent volume or object storage, which are slower to read.
Pricing by region
1 hr
RegionAWS on-demandAWS Spot1-yr Reserved3-yr ReservedRackspace SpotYou save
US East, N. Virginia$2.305$0.400$1.572$1.002$0.021
$2.284 savings
US Central, Chicagono AWS region$0.021
US Central, Dallasno AWS region$0.131
Hong Kong$0.021
Sydney, Australia$2.764$0.391$1.885$1.201$0.021
$2.743 savings
London, UK$2.683$0.323$1.831$1.167$0.131
$2.552 savings
US West, San Jose$0.002
US Central, Dallas 2no AWS region$0.242
When to use it
Good for
  • ●Data warehousing and log processing
  • ●Distributed file systems and search indexes
  • ●Transactional databases with heavy random I/O
  • ●Workloads that fit inside 96 GiB of RAM
  • ●Jobs that want 2 × 7,500 GB of local NVMe scratch space
  • ●Network-heavy services — AWS rates this size at 25 Gigabit
Avoid if
  • ●The working set needs more than 96 GiB of RAM
  • ●You cannot rebuild x86-only binaries or vendor images for aarch64
  • ●More than 6.00 GiB of RAM per vCPU is needed — that ratio is fixed for the whole family
  • ●The work is single-threaded. Most of these 16 vCPU would sit idle.
  • ●GPU or FPGA acceleration is needed
  • ●Workloads that never touch local disk. The instance-store premium is wasted.
$1,683/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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