Amazon Elastic File System (EFS)

Amazon Elastic File System (Amazon EFS) provides a simple, scalable, elastic file system for Linux-based workloads for use with AWS Cloud services and on-premises resources. It is built to scale on demand to petabytes without disrupting applications, growing and shrinking automatically as you add and remove files, so your applications have the storage they need – when they need it. It is designed to provide massively parallel shared access to thousands of Amazon EC2 instances, enabling your applications to achieve high levels of aggregate throughput and IOPS with consistent low latencies. Amazon EFS is a fully managed service that requires no changes to your existing applications and tools, providing access through a standard file system interface for seamless integration. There is a Standard and an Infrequent Access storage class available with Amazon EFS. Using Lifecycle Management, files not accessed for 30 days will automatically be moved to a cost-optimized Infrequent Access storage class, giving you a simple way to store and access active and infrequently accessed file system data in the same file system while reducing storage costs by up to 85%. Amazon EFS is a regional service storing data within and across multiple Availability Zones (AZs) for high availability and durability. You can access your file systems across AZs, regions, and VPCs and share files between thousands of Amazon EC2 instances and on-premises servers via AWS Direct Connect or AWS VPN. Amazon EFS is well suited to support a broad spectrum of use cases from highly parallelized, scale-out workloads that require the highest possible throughput to single-threaded, latency-sensitive workloads. Use cases such as lift-and-shift enterprise applications, big data analytics, web serving and content management, application development and testing, media and entertainment workflows, database backups, and container storage.

BENEFITS Dynamic Elasticity Amazon EFS automatically and instantly scales your file system storage capacity up or down as you add or remove files without disrupting your applications, giving you the storage you need – when you need it. You simply create your file system and start adding files with no need to provision storage in advance. Scalable Performance Amazon EFS is designed to provide the throughput, IOPS, and low latency needed for Linux workloads. Throughput and IOPS scale as a file system grows and can burst to higher throughput levels for short periods of time to support the unpredictable performance needs of file workloads. For the most demanding workloads, Amazon EFS can support performance over 10 GB/sec and up to 500,000 IOPS. Shared file storage Amazon EFS provides secure access for thousands of connections. Amazon EC2 instances and on-premises servers can simultaneously access a shared Amazon EFS file system using a traditional file permissions model, file locking capabilities, and hierarchical directory structure via the NFSv4 protocol. Amazon EC2 instances can access your file system across AZs and regions while on-premises servers can access using AWS Direct Connect or AWS VPN. Fully Managed Amazon EFS is a fully managed service providing shared file system storage for Linux workloads. It provides a simple interface allowing you to create and configure file systems quickly and manages the file storage infrastructure for you, removing the complexity of deploying, patching, and maintaining the underpinnings of a file system. Cost-effective With Amazon EFS storage, you pay only for what you use. There is no need to provision storage in advance and there are no minimum commitments or up-front fees. With Lifecycle Management, you can automatically move files that have not been accessed for 30 days to a cost-optimized storage class, reducing storage costs by up to 85%. Security and compliance Amazon EFS allows you to securely access your files using your existing security infrastructure. Control access to your Amazon EFS file systems with POSIX permissions, Amazon VPC, and AWS IAM. Secure your data by encrypting your data at rest and in transit. Amazon EFS also meets many eligibility and compliance requirements to help you meet your regulatory needs. Click here for a list of compliance programs in scope for Amazon EFS.