Automatically manage Amazon ECS capacity with cluster auto scaling - Amazon Elastic Container Service

Automatically manage Amazon ECS capacity with cluster auto scaling

Amazon ECS can manage the scaling of Amazon EC2 instances that are registered to your cluster. This is referred to as Amazon ECS cluster auto scaling. You turn on managed scaling when you create the Amazon ECS Auto Scaling group capacity provider. Then, you set a target percentage (the targetCapacity) for the instance utilization in this Auto Scaling group. Amazon ECS creates two custom CloudWatch metrics and a target tracking scaling policy for your Auto Scaling group. Amazon ECS then manages the scale-in and scale-out actions based on the resource utilization that your tasks use.

For each Auto Scaling group capacity provider that's associated with a cluster, Amazon ECS creates and manages the following resources:

  • A low metric value CloudWatch alarm

  • A high metric value CloudWatch alarm

  • A target tracking scaling policy

    Note

    Amazon ECS creates the target tracking scaling policy and attaches it to the Auto Scaling group. To update the target tracking scaling policy, update the capacity provider managed scaling settings, rather than updating the scaling policy directly.

When you turn off managed scaling or disassociate the capacity provider from a cluster, Amazon ECS removes both CloudWatch metrics and the target tracking scaling policy resources.

Amazon ECS uses the following metrics to determine what actions to take:

CapacityProviderReservation

The percent of container instances in use for a specific capacity provider. Amazon ECS generates this metric.

Amazon ECS sets the CapacityProviderReservation value to a number between 0-100. Amazon ECS uses the following formula to represent the ratio of how much capacity remains in the Auto Scaling group. Then, Amazon ECS publishes the metric to CloudWatch. For more information about how the metric is calculated, see Deep Dive on Amazon ECS Cluster Auto Scaling.

CapacityProviderReservation = (number of instances needed) / (number of running instances) x 100
DesiredCapacity

The amount of capacity for the Auto Scaling group. This metric isn't published to CloudWatch.

Amazon ECS publishes the CapacityProviderReservation metric to CloudWatch in the AWS/ECS/ManagedScaling namespace. The CapacityProviderReservation metric causes one of the following actions to occur:

The CapacityProviderReservation value equals targetCapacity

The Auto Scaling group doesn't need to scale in or scale out. The target utilization percentage has been reached.

The CapacityProviderReservation value is greater than targetCapacity

There are more tasks using a higher percentage of the capacity than your targetCapacity percentage. The increased value of the CapacityProviderReservation metric causes the associated CloudWatch alarm to act. This alarm updates the DesiredCapacity value for the Auto Scaling group. The Auto Scaling group uses this value to launch EC2 instances, and then register them with the cluster.

When the targetCapacity is the default value of 100 %, the new tasks are in the PENDING state during the scale-out because there is no available capacity on the instances to run the tasks. After the new instances register with ECS, these tasks will start on the new instances.

The CapacityProviderReservation value is less than targetCapacity

There are less tasks using a lower percentage of the capacity than your targetCapacity percentage and there is at least one instance that can be terminated. The decreased value of the CapacityProviderReservation metric causes the associated CloudWatch alarm to act. This alarm updates the DesiredCapacity value for the Auto Scaling group. The Auto Scaling group uses this value to terminate EC2 container instances, and then deregister them from the cluster.

The Auto Scaling group follows the group termination policy to determine which instances it terminates first during scale-in events. Additionally it avoids instances with the instance scale-in protection setting turned on. Cluster auto scaling can manage which instances have the instance scale-in protection setting if you turn on managed termination protection. For more information about managed termination protection, see Control the instances Amazon ECS terminates. For more information about how Auto Scaling groups terminate instances, see Control which Auto Scaling instances terminate during scale in in the Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling User Guide.

Consider the following when using cluster auto scaling:

  • Don't change or manage the desired capacity for the Auto Scaling group that's associated with a capacity provider with any scaling policies other than the one Amazon ECS manages.

  • When Amazon ECS scales out from 0 instances, it automatically launches 2 instances.

  • Amazon ECS uses the AWSServiceRoleForECS service-linked IAM role for the permissions that it requires to call AWS Auto Scaling on your behalf. For more information, see Using service-linked roles for Amazon ECS.

  • When using capacity providers with Auto Scaling groups, the user, group, or role that creates the capacity providers requires the autoscaling:CreateOrUpdateTags permission. This is because Amazon ECS adds a tag to the Auto Scaling group when it associates it with the capacity provider.

    Important

    Make sure any tooling that you use doesn't remove the AmazonECSManaged tag from the Auto Scaling group. If this tag is removed, Amazon ECS can't manage the scaling.

  • Cluster auto scaling doesn't modify the MinimumCapacity or MaximumCapacity for the group. For the group to scale out, the value for MaximumCapacity must be greater than zero.

  • When Auto Scaling (managed scaling) is turned on, a capacity provider can only be connected to one cluster at the same time. If your capacity provider has managed scaling turned off, you can associate it with multiple clusters.

  • When managed scaling is turned off, the capacity provider doesn't scale in or scale out. You can use a capacity provider strategy to balance your tasks between capacity providers.

  • The binpack strategy is the most efficient strategy in terms of capacity.

  • When the target capacity is less than 100%, the placement strategy needs to use the binpack strategy must have a higher order than the spread strategy. This prevents the capacity provider from scaling out until each task has a dedicated instance or the limit is reached.

Turn on cluster auto scaling

You can turn on cluster auto scaling by using the Console or the AWS CLI.

When you create a cluster for the EC2 launch type using the console, Amazon ECS creates an Auto Scaling group on your behalf and sets the target capacity. For more information, see Creating an Amazon ECS cluster for the Amazon EC2 launch type.

You can also create an Auto Scaling group, and then assign it to a cluster. For more information, see Updating an Amazon ECS capacity provider.

When you use the AWS CLI, after you create the cluster

  1. Before you create the capacity provider, you need to create an Auto Scaling group. For more information, see Auto Scaling groups in the Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling User Guide.

  2. Use put-cluster-capacity-providers to modify the cluster capacity provider. For more information, see Turning on Amazon ECS cluster auto scaling.