What is AWS?
Author: Domeny.ForSale editorial team Published
In brief: AWS, or Amazon Web Services, is Amazon’s cloud platform, providing servers, file storage, databases and more over the internet. Instead of buying your own hardware, you provision the resources you need and pay according to each service’s pricing rules, often based on usage. AWS offers considerable flexibility, but requires cost control and security configuration — it is not simply hosting with a higher storage limit.
How does the AWS cloud work?
Cloud computing means using a provider’s IT resources over a network. The hardware is located in AWS data centres, and customers manage their chosen services through a console, developer tools or code that defines the infrastructure. For example, they can launch a server for testing and then delete it.
Resources are usually deployed in a chosen region, a geographical area of AWS infrastructure. A region contains separate availability zones — distinct infrastructure locations designed to limit the impact of failures. Distributing an application across zones can improve its resilience, but requires an appropriate architecture; an AWS account alone does not provide this.
Not every service requires you to manage a server yourself. With managed services, the provider takes on some of the work, such as hardware maintenance or certain updates. Customers remain responsible for their data, permissions and configuration to the extent applicable to each service.
What are the main AWS services used for?
AWS is not a single program. It is a collection of services that can be used to build a website, an online shop, a mobile application, a testing environment or a data processing system. To start with, it is enough to distinguish a few basic components:
| Service | What it provides | Example use |
|---|---|---|
| Amazon EC2 | Virtual servers, known as instances | Running an application with your own system configuration |
| Amazon S3 | Object storage: files together with metadata | Product photos, documents, backups |
| Amazon RDS | Managed relational databases | Storing orders and user accounts |
| AWS Lambda | Running code without managing servers | Resizing a photo after a file is uploaded |
| Amazon CloudFront | A CDN that delivers content from distributed locations | Distributing website images and files |
| Amazon Route 53 | DNS services, which direct requests to services associated with a domain | Pointing a domain to an application |
S3 is not a regular server disk, and Route 53 does not replace application hosting. The services serve different roles and often work together. However, you do not have to use them all: a simple website may require a much smaller set than an online shop with payments and customer accounts.
AWS or regular hosting — which should you choose?
Typical shared hosting offers a ready-made package: website storage, a control panel, a database and often email too. The provider maintains the environment, while the user focuses mainly on the website. Responsibilities and limits depend on the offering, but setting up a popular CMS is usually simpler than assembling AWS infrastructure yourself.
In AWS, you can select computing power, data storage and networking services separately. Scaling means increasing or decreasing resources according to your needs. It can happen automatically if you configure the appropriate mechanisms, but more traffic can also mean a larger bill.
For example, for a local practice that needs a website listing its services and a contact form, a ready-made hosting package will usually be the simpler choice. For an application that accepts photos from users, AWS allows you to store files in S3, process them with Lambda and deliver them through CloudFront. This separation offers flexibility, but requires you to design file access, error handling and billing.
AWS therefore makes particular sense when you need specific cloud services or control over the architecture and have the skills to maintain it. Simply hosting a website in the cloud does not guarantee speed or reliability.
How much does AWS cost, and where do unexpected charges come from?
AWS does not have a single subscription price covering the entire platform. Your bill may depend on how long resources run, their specifications, the amount of data stored, the number of operations and data transfer. Prices and service availability also vary between regions.
Turning off an application does not always stop charges from accruing. After an EC2 instance is stopped, billable disks, data copies or other resources may remain. Deleting one component does not automatically delete the entire environment.
Before deployment, estimate the monthly cost using the official AWS Pricing Calculator and check the pricing for your chosen services. If you use the Free Tier programme or promotional credits, confirm the current terms for your account: limits, the period they apply for and how you will be billed once they are used up. A “free start” does not mean every configuration is free of charge.
Set up cost notifications in AWS Budgets. A budget alert is not an automatic hard spending limit — its main purpose is to warn you, while additional actions require configuration and have a defined scope.
How can you start using AWS safely?
AWS uses a shared responsibility model: the provider secures the cloud infrastructure, while customers are responsible for matters such as making their resources accessible appropriately. The exact division of responsibilities depends on the service; EC2 involves more administrative tasks than managed services.
For your first project, follow this short procedure:
- Secure the root account with multi-factor authentication (MFA) and do not use it for everyday work.
- Give users and applications only the permissions they need for their tasks.
- Choose a region, taking into account your audience’s location, service availability and data requirements.
- Set up cost alerts and backup policies, and check how to restore your data.
- After testing, delete unnecessary resources, then check the billing dashboard.
For your first experiment, choose a small project without customer data, such as a static test website. Before launching it, establish not only how to deploy it, but also the procedure for deleting its resources and the expected cost of the test.
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