Work with Dedicated Instances

You can create a VPC with an instance tenancy of dedicated to ensure that all instances launched into the VPC are Dedicated Instances. Alternatively, you can specify the tenancy of the instance during launch.

Create a VPC with a dedicated instance tenancy

When you create a VPC, you have the option of specifying its instance tenancy. If you launch an instance into a VPC that has an instance tenancy of dedicated, the instance will always run as a Dedicated Instance on hardware that's dedicated for your use.

For more information about creating a VPC and choosing the tenancy options, see Create a VPC in the Amazon VPC User Guide.

Launch Dedicated Instances into a VPC

You can launch a Dedicated Instance using the Amazon EC2 launch instance wizard.

Console

To launch a Dedicated Instance into a default tenancy VPC using the console

1. Open the Amazon EC2 console at https://console.aws.amazon.com/ec2/.

2. In the navigation pane, choose Instances, Launch instance.

3. In the Application and OS Images section, select an AMI from the list.

4. In the Instance type section, select the instance type to launch.

   Note

   Ensure that you choose an instance type that's supported as a Dedicated Instance. For more information, see Amazon EC2 Dedicated Instances.

5. In the Key pair section, select the key pair to associate with the instance.

6. In the Advanced details section, for Tenancy, select Dedicated.

7. Configure the remaining instance options as needed. For more information, see Launch an instance using defined parameters.

8. Choose Launch instance.

Command line

To set the tenancy option for an instance during launch using the command line

• run-instances (AWS CLI)

• New-EC2Instance (AWS Tools for Windows PowerShell)

For more information about launching an instance with a tenancy of host, see Launch instances onto a Dedicated Host.

Display tenancy information

Console

To display tenancy information for your VPC using the console

1. Open the Amazon VPC console at https://console.aws.amazon.com/vpc/.

2. In the navigation pane, choose Your VPCs.

3. Check the instance tenancy of your VPC in the Tenancy column.

4. If the Tenancy column isn't displayed, choose settings ( ) in the top-right corner, turn on Tenancy, and choose Confirm.

To display tenancy information for your instance using the console

1. Open the Amazon EC2 console at https://console.aws.amazon.com/ec2/.

2. In the navigation pane, choose Instances.

3. Check the tenancy of your instance in the Tenancy column.

4. If the Tenancy column isn't displayed, do one of the following:

   • Choose settings ( ) in the top-right corner, turn on Tenancy, and choose Confirm.

   • Select the instance. On the Details tab near the bottom of the page, under Host and placement group, check the value for Tenancy.

Command line

To describe the tenancy of your VPC using the command line

• describe-vpcs (AWS CLI)

• Get-EC2Vpc (AWS Tools for Windows PowerShell)

To describe the tenancy of your instance using the command line

• describe-instances (AWS CLI)

• Get-EC2Instance (AWS Tools for Windows PowerShell)

To describe the tenancy value of a Reserved Instance using the command line

• describe-reserved-instances (AWS CLI)

• Get-EC2ReservedInstance (AWS Tools for Windows PowerShell)

To describe the tenancy value of a Reserved Instance offering using the command line

• describe-reserved-instances-offerings (AWS CLI)

• Get-EC2ReservedInstancesOffering (AWS Tools for Windows PowerShell)

Change the tenancy of an instance

You can change the tenancy of a stopped instance after launch. The changes that you make take effect the next time the instance starts.

The operating system details of your instance—and whether SQL Server is installed—affect what conversions are supported. For more information about the tenancy conversion paths available to your instance, see Tenancy conversion in the License Manager User Guide.

Note

For T3 instances, you must launch the instance on a Dedicated Host to use a tenancy of host. You can't change the tenancy from host to dedicated or default. Attempting to make one of these unsupported tenancy changes results in an InvalidRequest error code.

Console

To change the tenancy of an instance using the console

1. Open the Amazon EC2 console at https://console.aws.amazon.com/ec2/.

2. In the navigation pane, choose Instances and select your instance.

3. Choose Instance state, Stop instance, Stop.

4. Choose Actions, Instance settings, Modify instance placement.

5. For Tenancy, choose whether to run your instance on dedicated hardware or on a Dedicated Host. Choose Save.

Command line

To modify the tenancy value of an instance using the command line

• modify-instance-placement (AWS CLI)

• Edit-EC2InstancePlacement (AWS Tools for Windows PowerShell)

Change the tenancy of a VPC

You can change the instance tenancy of a VPC from dedicated to default after you create it. Modifying the instance tenancy of the VPC does not affect the tenancy of any existing instances in the VPC. The next time you launch an instance in the VPC, it has a tenancy of default, unless you specify otherwise during launch.

Note

You cannot change the instance tenancy of a VPC from default to dedicated after it is created.

You can modify the instance tenancy of a VPC using the AWS CLI, an AWS SDK, or the Amazon EC2 API only.

Command line

To modify the instance tenancy attribute of a VPC using the AWS CLI

Use the modify-vpc-tenancy command and specify the ID of the VPC and instance tenancy value. The only supported value is default.

aws ec2 modify-vpc-tenancy --vpc-id vpc-1a2b3c4d --instance-tenancy default