I use spot instances for my development environment; saves me a ton on GPU instance types. I have an AMI w/ NICE DCV configured, Launch Template and a ASG set up that starts one up on-demand when needed. I have EFS set up as my persistent storage. Works great honestly. Answer from coinclink on reddit.com
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Spot.io
spot.io › home › aws ec2 pricing › what are aws spot instances?
What are AWS spot instances?
December 13, 2022 - Spot instances pricing has helped them greatly optimize their cloud costs. AWS spot instances represent AWS’s excess capacity. As a cloud provider, they must have spare capacity available for any surge in customer demand. To offset the loss of idle infrastructure, AWS offers this excess capacity at a massive discount to drive usage.
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Finout
finout.io › blog › aws-spot-instances
What Are AWS Spot Instances, Pros/Cons, and 6 Ways to Save Even More
May 22, 2025 - AWS spot instances allow users to bid on spare EC2 compute capacity, and can be up to 90% cheaper than regular on-demand instances.
Discussions

Do people actually use Amazon EC2 Spot?
I use spot instances for my development environment; saves me a ton on GPU instance types. I have an AMI w/ NICE DCV configured, Launch Template and a ASG set up that starts one up on-demand when needed. I have EFS set up as my persistent storage. Works great honestly. More on reddit.com
🌐 r/aws
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June 24, 2023
Amazon EC2-what is the difference between on demand and on spot instances other than pricing that spot is more cheaper than on demand - Stack Overflow
The resources for both are the same, spot instances utilise the spare compute capacity within the AWS availability zone (those that are not reserved or launched on-demand). More on stackoverflow.com
🌐 stackoverflow.com
AWS EC2 Spot Instances Availability by Region
You can check out the Spot Instance Advisor: https://aws.amazon.com/ec2/spot/instance-advisor/ or in your EC2 console you can check out Spot Pricing History graphs to see more information. More on reddit.com
🌐 r/aws
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May 5, 2022
Running docker images on ec2 spot instances

Is Powering your Amazon ECS Clusters with Spot Fleet helpful?

Edit to add: you might also consider the Docker for AWS Beta, then mashup with spot.

More on reddit.com
🌐 r/aws
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September 29, 2015
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AWS
aws.amazon.com › compute › amazon ec2 › spot instances
Spot Instance - Amazon EC2 Spot Instances - AWS
4 days ago - Amazon EC2 Spot Instances let you take advantage of unused EC2 capacity in the AWS cloud and are available at up to a 90% discount compared to On-Demand prices.
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Amazon Web Services
docs.aws.amazon.com › amazon ec2 › user guide › amazon ec2 instances › amazon ec2 billing and purchasing options › spot instances
Spot Instances - Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud
A Spot Instance is an instance that uses spare EC2 capacity that is available for less than the On-Demand price. Because Spot Instances enable you to request unused EC2 instances at steep discounts, you can lower your Amazon EC2 costs significantly. The hourly price for a Spot Instance is called ...
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Medium
medium.com › @moradiyabhavik › aws-spot-instances-what-they-are-and-how-they-can-save-you-money-3e14653e7b80
AWS Spot Instances: What They Are and How They Can Save You Money | by Bhavik Moradiya | Medium
April 5, 2023 - These unused instances, also known ... cost-effective option for organizations. ... AWS Spot Instances work by allowing organizations to bid on unused EC2 instances....
Find elsewhere
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Quora
quora.com › What-are-AWS-spot-instances
What are AWS spot instances? - Quora
Answer: Taken from AWS documentation: “A Spot Instance is an unused EC2 instance that is available for less than the On-Demand price. Because Spot Instances enable you to request unused EC2 instances at steep discounts, you can lower your ...
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Amazon Web Services
docs.aws.amazon.com › amazon ec2 › user guide › amazon ec2 instances › amazon ec2 billing and purchasing options › spot instances › best practices for amazon ec2 spot
Best practices for Amazon EC2 Spot - Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud
Amazon EC2 provides access to spare EC2 compute capacity in the AWS Cloud through Spot Instances at savings of up to 90% compared to On-Demand prices. The only difference between On-Demand Instances and Spot Instances is that Spot Instances can be interrupted by Amazon EC2, with two minutes of notice, if Amazon EC2 needs to reclaim the capacity.
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Zesty
zesty.co › home › spot instances
What are spot instances in AWS?
May 7, 2024 - Spot Instances in cloud computing are a pricing model offered by cloud service providers, such as Amazon Web Services (AWS), where users bid for unused compute capacity at significantly lower prices compared to on-demand instances.
Top answer
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Actually there are three allocation types:

  • on demand - kind of "default" mode. You request an instance, if there is free capacity, you will get the instance. No long term commitment, but once you get an instance, it's yours. It may happen that you will get a message that there is no free capacity for the specific instance type and AZ (so far it happened to me only once with AWS).

  • reserved - AWS reserves the capacity for you. You have guarantee that you will get the instance type in the selected region or AZ.

  • spot instance - it's kind of auction / bidding of unused capacity. You ask for an instance, you provide your maximum price and if there is free capacity and your price is at the current price or higher, you will get an instance. The difference is - if the free capacity is exhausted, or the current price is higher than your maximum bid price, your spot instance is terminated . You can get a termination warning event upfront.

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The resources for both are the same, spot instances utilise the spare compute capacity within the AWS availability zone (those that are not reserved or launched on-demand).

Depending on the demand for that instance class in the availability zone the spot price will increase or decrease (even surpassing the on-demand price).

When you use a spot instance you are taking a risk that if demand increases you will lose access to the spot instance (you are given a 2 minute warning before termination). For his reason it is common to use a mixture of on-demand/reserved instances and spot instances so that you can withstand instance terminations.

Commonly in EC2 applications you would use an autoscaling group with a configured proportion between on-demand/reserved nodes and spot instances.

For more information take a look at the Requesting Spot Instances for fault-tolerant and flexible applications documentation.

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Medium
medium.com › @chaisarfati › an-overview-of-ec2-spot-instances-c580e72510ce
An Overview of EC2 Spot Instances | by Chai Sarfati | Medium
February 11, 2024 - The hotel is AWS, the guest is ... now clearly define EC2 Spot. A Spot Instance is an instance that uses spare EC2 capacity that is available for less than the On-Demand price....
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Quora
quora.com › What-are-AWS-EC2-spot-instances-typically-used-for-by-customers
What are AWS EC2 spot instances typically used for by customers? - Quora
Answer: spot instances work on Bid pricing of the hour. When the bid prices go higher you lose the instance. With this mind mostly all stateless compute jobs, jobs that require no mandatory job completion.
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Amazon Web Services
docs.aws.amazon.com › amazon ec2 › user guide › amazon ec2 instances › amazon ec2 billing and purchasing options › spot instances › get the status of a spot instance request
Get the status of a Spot Instance request - AWS Documentation
The following illustration shows how Spot Instance requests work. Notice that the request type (one-time or persistent) determines whether the request is opened again when Amazon EC2 interrupts a Spot Instance or if you stop a Spot Instance. If the request is persistent, the request is opened again after your Spot Instance is interrupted.
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Amazon Web Services
docs.aws.amazon.com › amazon ec2 › user guide › amazon ec2 instances › amazon ec2 billing and purchasing options › spot instances › tag spot instance requests
Tag Spot Instance requests - Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud
Use the describe-spot-instance-requests command to view the configuration of the specified Spot Instance request, which includes any tags that were specified for the request. aws ec2 describe-spot-instance-requests \ --spot-instance-request-ids sir-0e54a519c9EXAMPLE \ --query "SpotInstanceRequests[*].Tags"
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AWS
docs.aws.amazon.com › amazon ec2 › api reference › actions › requestspotinstances
RequestSpotInstances - Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud
When you specify an Availability Zone group in a Spot Instance request, all Spot Instances in the request are launched in the same Availability Zone. Instance proximity is maintained with this parameter, but the choice of Availability Zone is not. The group applies only to requests for Spot ...
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Bitslovers
bitslovers.com › spot-instances-in-aws
Spot Instances in AWS [Complete Guide] | Bits Lovers' - Cloud Computing and DevOps
December 20, 2021 - So to use Spot Instances, you must first determine your highest for it. And the AWS will provision the instance so long as the spot price is below your highest spot price. For example, let’s imagine you were prepared to expend two dollars an hour. If Amazon spot prices are 75 cents an hour, AWS will provision your instances.
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CloudKeeper
cloudkeeper.com › home › glossary › spot instances (aws)
Spot Instances (AWS) | CloudKeeper
How Spot Instances WorkAWS continuously monitors available EC2 capacity. When there is unused capacity in a given availability zone, AWS offers it at reduced prices as Spot Instances. Users can request these instances through the AWS Management Console, EC2 Fleet, Auto Scaling Groups, or APIs.
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AWS
docs.aws.amazon.com › aws batch › user guide › best practices for aws batch › amazon ec2 on-demand or amazon ec2 spot
Amazon EC2 On-Demand or Amazon EC2 Spot - AWS Batch
Most AWS Batch customers use Amazon EC2 Spot instances because of the savings over On-Demand instances. However, if your workload runs for multiple hours and can't be interrupted, On-Demand instances might be more suitable for you. You can always try Spot instances first and switch to On-Demand ...
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wikiHow
wikihow.tech › finance and business › shopping › shopping online › amazon › how to use amazon ec2 spot instances - wikihow tech
How to Use Amazon EC2 Spot Instances - wikiHow Tech
October 22, 2025 - The ratios of spot prices across different instance classes may also be different from the ratios of on-demand prices. In general, prices are more volatile for larger instances because the smaller number of instances makes prices more sensitive to individual bids. Moreover, for larger instance types, fluctuations in price tend to last longer than minor blips. Note that this reverses a trend seen in the early years of AWS, where larger instances had very stable prices (mostly because very few people were aware of their existence) and smaller instances had more price fluctuations.