Invalidate files

You can use the CloudFront console to create and run an invalidation, display a list of the invalidations that you submitted previously, and display detailed information about an individual invalidation. You can also copy an existing invalidation, edit the list of file paths, and run the edited invalidation. You can't remove invalidations from the list.

Contents

• Invalidate files
• Copy, edit, and rerun an existing invalidation
• Cancel invalidations
• List invalidations
• Display information about an invalidation

Invalidate files

To invalidate files using the CloudFront console, do the following.

Console

To invalidate files (console)

1. Sign in to the AWS Management Console and open the CloudFront console at https://console.aws.amazon.com/cloudfront/v4/home.

2. Choose the distribution for which you want to invalidate files.

3. Choose the Invalidations tab.

4. Choose Create invalidation.

5. For the files that you want to invalidate, enter one invalidation path per line. For information about specifying invalidation paths, see What you need to know when invalidating files.

   Important

   Specify file paths carefully. You can’t cancel an invalidation request after you start it.

6. Choose Create invalidation.

CloudFront API

To learn about invalidating objects and displaying information about invalidations, see the following topics in the Amazon CloudFront API Reference:

• CreateInvalidation

• ListInvalidations

• GetInvalidation

Note

If you use the AWS Command Line Interface (AWS CLI) to invalidate files and you specify a path that includes the * wildcard, you must use quotes (") around the path, such as the following example:

aws cloudfront create-invalidation --distribution-id distribution_ID --paths "/*"

Copy, edit, and rerun an existing invalidation

You can copy an invalidation that you created previously, update the list of invalidation paths, and run the updated invalidation. You can't copy an existing invalidation, update the invalidation paths, and then save the updated invalidation without running it.

Important

If you copy an invalidation that is still in progress, update the list of invalidation paths, and then run the updated invalidation, CloudFront won't stop or delete the invalidation that you copied. If any invalidation paths appear in the original and in the copy, CloudFront will try to invalidate the files twice, and both invalidations will count against your maximum number of free invalidations for the month. If you already reached the maximum number of free invalidations, you will be charged for both invalidations of each file. For more information, see Concurrent invalidation request maximum.

To copy, edit, and rerun an existing invalidation

1. Sign in to the AWS Management Console and open the CloudFront console at https://console.aws.amazon.com/cloudfront/v4/home.

2. Select the distribution that contains the invalidation that you want to copy.

3. Choose the Invalidations tab.

4. Choose the invalidation that you want to copy.

   If you aren’t sure which invalidation you want to copy, you can choose an invalidation and choose View details to display detailed information about that invalidation.

5. Choose Copy to new.

6. Update the list of invalidation paths if applicable.

7. Choose Create invalidation.

Cancel invalidations

When you submit an invalidation request to CloudFront, CloudFront forwards the request to all edge locations within a few seconds, and each edge location starts processing the invalidation immediately. As a result, you can’t cancel an invalidation after you submit it.

List invalidations

You can display a list of the last 100 invalidations that you’ve created and run for a distribution by using the CloudFront console. If you want to get a list of more than 100 invalidations, use the ListInvalidations API operation. For more information, see ListInvalidations in the Amazon CloudFront API Reference.

To list invalidations

1. Sign in to the AWS Management Console and open the CloudFront console at https://console.aws.amazon.com/cloudfront/v4/home.

2. Select the distribution for which you want to display a list of invalidations.

3. Choose the Invalidations tab.

Note

You can’t remove invalidations from the list.

Display information about an invalidation

You can display detailed information about an invalidation, including distribution ID, invalidation ID, the status of the invalidation, the date and time that the invalidation was created, and a complete list of the invalidation paths.

To display information about an invalidation

1. Sign in to the AWS Management Console and open the CloudFront console at https://console.aws.amazon.com/cloudfront/v4/home.

2. Select the distribution that contains the invalidation that you want to display detailed information for.

3. Choose the Invalidations tab.

4. Choose the applicable invalidation ID or select the invalidation ID and then choose View details.