Install and Configure SSM Agent on Amazon EC2 Windows Instances

SSM Agent is installed by default on instances created from Windows Server 2016 and Windows Server 2019 Amazon Machine Images (AMIs), and on instances created from Windows Server 2008-2012 R2 AMIs published in November 2016 or later.

If your instance is a Windows Server 2008-2012 R2 instance created before November 2016, then EC2Config processes Systems Manager requests on your instance. We recommend that you upgrade your existing instances to use the latest version of EC2Config. By using the latest EC2Config installer, you install SSM Agent side-by-side with EC2Config. This side-by-side version of SSM Agent is compatible with your instances created from earlier Windows AMIs and enables you to use SSM features published after November 2016. For information about how to install the latest version of the EC2Config service, see Installing the Latest Version of EC2Config in the Amazon EC2 User Guide for Windows Instances.

Important

An updated version of SSM Agent is released whenever new capabilities are added to Systems Manager or updates are made to existing capabilities. If an older version of the agent is running on an instance, some SSM Agent processes can fail. For that reason, we recommend that you automate the process of keeping SSM Agent up-to-date on your instances. For information, see Automate Updates to SSM Agent. To be notified about SSM Agent updates, subscribe to the SSM Agent Release Notes page on GitHub.

If necessary, you can manually download and install the latest version of SSM Agent on your Amazon EC2 Windows instance by using the following procedure.

Important

This procedure applies to installing or reinstalling SSM Agent on an Amazon EC2 Windows instance. If you need to install the agent on an on-premises server or a virtual machine (VM) so it can be used with Systems Manager, see Install SSM Agent for a Hybrid Environment (Windows).

To manually download and install the latest version of SSM Agent

1. Log in to your instance by using Remote Desktop or Windows PowerShell.

2. Download the latest version of SSM Agent to your instance. You can download using either PowerShell commands or a direct download link.

   Note

   The URLs in this step let you download SSM Agent from any AWS region. If you want to download the agent from a specific region, use a region-specific URL instead:

   https://amazon-ssm-region.s3.amazonaws.com/latest/windows_amd64/AmazonSSMAgentSetup.exe

   region represents the identifier for an AWS Region supported by AWS Systems Manager, such as us-east-2 for the US East (Ohio) Region. For a list of supported region values, see the Region column in Systems Manager Service Endpoints in the Amazon Web Services General Reference.

   PowerShell

   Run the following three PowerShell commands in order. These commands enable you to download SSM Agent without adjusting Internet Explorer (IE) Enhanced Security settings, and then install the agent and remove the installation file.

   Invoke-WebRequest `
   	https://s3.amazonaws.com/ec2-downloads-windows/SSMAgent/latest/windows_amd64/AmazonSSMAgentSetup.exe `
   	-OutFile $env:USERPROFILE\Desktop\SSMAgent_latest.exe

   Start-Process `
   	-FilePath $env:USERPROFILE\Desktop\SSMAgent_latest.exe `
   	-ArgumentList "/S"

   rm -Force $env:USERPROFILE\Desktop\SSMAgent_latest.exe

   Direct download

   Download the latest version of SSM Agent to your instance by using the following link. If you want, update this URL with an AWS Region-specific URL.

   https://s3.amazonaws.com/ec2-downloads-windows/SSMAgent/latest/windows_amd64/AmazonSSMAgentSetup.exe

   Run the downloaded AmazonSSMAgentSetup.exe file to install SSM Agent.

3. Start or restart SSM Agent by sending the following command in PowerShell:

   Restart-Service AmazonSSMAgent

Important

SSM Agent requires Windows PowerShell 3.0 or later to run certain SSM Documents on Windows instances (for example, the legacy AWS-ApplyPatchBaseline document). Verify that your Windows instances are running Windows Management Framework 3.0 or later. This framework includes Windows PowerShell. For more information, see Windows Management Framework 3.0.