More detail
You choose the size (the instance type), the operating system (the AMI) and the network, and EC2 gives you a running server. Everything on it, from patching to the web server, is your job.
EC2 (Elastic Compute Cloud)
Rent a virtual server by the second.
Think of it as: Renting a computer you have to look after yourself.
What to know for Level 0
- The AMI decides what a server starts with (operating system and software); the instance type decides its size (CPU and memory).
- On-Demand Linux instances are billed per second while running, with a one-minute minimum. A stopped instance only pays for its disk.
- An app on EC2 gets AWS permissions from a role attached through an instance profile, never from access keys in files or user data.
- EC2 doesn't send logs by itself: install the CloudWatch agent and let the instance's role write logs.