Instances›AWS EC2›m3›m3.2xlarge
Compute
vCPUs8
Memory30 GiB
Mem / vCPU3.75 GiB
ProcessorXeon E5-2670 v2
Clock speed2.5 GHz
Architecturex86_64
Storage
Type2 × 80 GB SSD
Bandwidth1,000 Mbps
Throughput125 MB/s
IOPS8,000
Networking
PerformanceHigh
Max ENIs4
IPv6No
GPUNone
Family sizes
m3.medium1 vCPU · 3.75 GiB
m3.large2 vCPU · 7.5 GiB
m3.xlarge4 vCPU · 15 GiB
m3.2xlarge8 vCPU · 30 GiB
m3.2xlarge

The m3.2xlarge is a general-purpose AWS EC2 instance: 8 vCPU and 30 GiB of memory, 3.75 GiB per vCPU. In the name, "m" is the general-purpose line, "3" is the generation and "2xlarge" is the size within the m3 family. It runs on Intel Xeon E5-2670 v2 (Ivy Bridge/Sandy Bridge) at 2.5 GHz, and AWS introduced it in October 2012. AWS has since shipped m4, m5, m6i and m7i; m4.2xlarge is the direct replacement at this size. Rackspace Spot's gp.vs1.xlarge is a like-for-like substitute at 8 vCPU and 32 GiB, about 94% below the US East (N. Virginia) on-demand rate.

Match qualityNo local disk

m3.2xlarge comes with 2 × 80 GB SSD attached to the machine. Rackspace Spot nodes use network storage only, so that disk does not come with it.

If you were using the local disk as fast scratch space — temporary files, a local cache, an index — you will need a persistent volume or object storage instead, and both are slower to read. If it was just extra space you never depended on, nothing changes.

Pricing by region
1 hr
RegionAWS on-demandAWS Spot1-yr Reserved3-yr ReservedRackspace SpotYou save
US East, N. Virginia$0.532$0.150$0.380$0.031
$0.501 savings
US Central, Chicagono AWS region$0.021
US Central, Dallasno AWS region$0.081
Hong Kong$0.006
Sydney, Australia$0.745$0.211$0.517$0.338$0.006
$0.739 savings
London, UK$0.031
US West, San Jose$0.616$0.162$0.464$0.081
$0.535 savings
US Central, Dallas 2no AWS region$0.081
US East, N. Virginia 2$0.532$0.150$0.380$0.081
$0.451 savings
When to use it
Good for
  • ●Development, staging and CI environments
  • ●Small to mid-size relational databases
  • ●Backend services with no single dominant resource
  • ●Workloads that fit inside 30 GiB of RAM
  • ●Jobs that want 2 × 80 GB of local SSD scratch space
Avoid if
  • ●Starting a new deployment. m4.2xlarge is the newer generation at this size.
  • ●The working set needs more than 30 GiB of RAM
  • ●More than 3.75 GiB of RAM per vCPU is needed — that ratio is fixed for the whole family
  • ●GPU or FPGA acceleration is needed
  • ●Sustained full-core CPU load. A compute-optimized family costs less per unit of work.
$388/mo on AWS on-demand against $23/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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