Amazon ECS-optimized AMI
Amazon ECS provides the Amazon ECS-optimized AMIs that are preconfigured with the requirements and recommendations to run your container workloads on Amazon ECS Linux instances. We recommend that you use the Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux 2023 AMI for your Amazon EC2 instances unless your application requires Amazon EC2 GPU-based instances, a specific operating system or a Docker version that is not yet available in that AMI. For information about the the Amazon Linux 2 and Amazon Linux 2023 instances, see Comparing Amazon Linux 2 and Amazon Linux 2023 in the Amazon Linux 2023 User Guide.
Although you can create your own Amazon EC2 instance AMI that meets the basic specifications needed to run your containerized workloads on Amazon ECS, the Amazon ECS-optimized AMIs are preconfigured and tested on Amazon ECS by Amazon engineers. It is the simplest way for you to get started and to get your containers running on Amazon quickly.
The Amazon ECS-optimized AMI metadata, including the AMI name, Amazon ECS container agent
version, and Amazon ECS runtime version which includes the Docker version, for each variant can
be retrieved programmatically. The Linux variants of the Amazon ECS-optimized AMI use the Amazon Linux 2
AMI as their base. The Amazon Linux 2 AMI release notes are available as well. For more
information, see Amazon Linux 2 release
notes
Launching your container instances from the most recent Amazon ECS-Optimized AMI ensures that you receive the current security updates and container agent version. For information about how to launch an instance, see Launching an Amazon ECS Linux container instance.
The following variants of the Amazon ECS-optimized AMI are available for your Amazon EC2 instances.
| Operating system | AMI | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Amazon Linux 2023 |
Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux 2023 AMI |
Amazon Linux 2023 is the next generation of Amazon Linux from Amazon. For most cases, recommended for launching your Amazon EC2 instances for your Amazon ECS workloads. For more information, see What is Amazon Linux 2023 in the Amazon Linux 2023 User Guide. |
| Amazon Linux 2023 (arm64) |
Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux 2023 (arm64) AMI |
Based on Amazon Linux 2023 this AMI is recommended for use when launching your Amazon EC2 instances, which are powered by Arm-based Amazon Graviton/Graviton 2 Processors, for your Amazon ECS workloads. For more information, see General Purpose Instances in the Amazon EC2 User Guide for Linux Instances. The Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux 2023 (arm64) AMI does not come with the Amazon CLI preinstalled. |
| Amazon Linux 2023 (Neuron) |
Amazon ECS optimized Amazon Linux 2023 (Neuron) AMI |
Based on Amazon Linux 2023, this AMI is recommended for use when launching your Amazon EC2 Inf1 instances. It comes pre-configured with Amazon Inferentia drivers and the Amazon Neuron runtime for Docker which makes running machine learning inference workloads easier on Amazon ECS. For more information, see Using Amazon Neuron on Amazon Linux 2 on Amazon ECS. The Amazon ECS optimized Amazon Linux 2023 (Neuron) AMI does not come with the Amazon CLI preinstalled. |
|
Amazon Linux 2 |
Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux 2 AMI |
This is for your Amazon ECS workloads. The Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux 2 AMI does not come with the Amazon CLI preinstalled. |
|
Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux 2 kernel 5.10 AMI |
Based on Amazon Linux 2, this AMI is for use when launching your Amazon EC2 instances and you want to use Linux kernel 5.10 instead of kernel 4.14 for your Amazon ECS workloads. The Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux 2 kernel 5.10 AMI does not come with the Amazon CLI preinstalled. | |
|
Amazon Linux 2 (arm64) |
Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux 2 (arm64) AMI |
Based on Amazon Linux 2, this AMI is for use when launching your Amazon EC2 instances, which are powered by Arm-based Amazon Graviton/Graviton 2 Processors, for your Amazon ECS workloads. For more information, see General Purpose Instances in the Amazon EC2 User Guide for Linux Instances. The Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux 2 (arm64) AMI does not come with the Amazon CLI preinstalled. |
|
Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux 2 kernel 5.10 (arm64) AMI |
Based on Amazon Linux 2, this AMI is for your Amazon EC2 instances, which are powered by Arm-based Amazon Graviton/Graviton 2 Processors, and you want to use Linux kernel 5.10 instead of Linux kernel 4.14 for your Amazon ECS workloads. The Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux 2 kernel 5.10 (arm64) AMI does not come with the Amazon CLI preinstalled. |
|
|
Amazon Linux 2 (GPU) |
Amazon ECS GPU-optimized AMI |
Based on Amazon Linux 2, this AMI is recommended for use when launching your Amazon EC2 GPU-based instances for your Amazon ECS workloads. It comes pre-configured with NVIDIA kernel drivers and a Docker GPU runtime which makes running workloads that take advantage of GPUs on Amazon ECS. For more information, see Working with GPUs on Amazon ECS. |
| Amazon Linux 2 (Neuron) |
Amazon ECS optimized Amazon Linux 2 (Neuron) AMI |
Based on Amazon Linux 2, this AMI is for Amazon EC2 Inf1, Trn1 or Inf2 instances. It comes pre-configured with Amazon Inferentia and Amazon Trainium drivers and the Amazon Neuron runtime for Docker which makes running machine learning inference workloads easier on Amazon ECS. For more information, see Using Amazon Neuron on Amazon Linux 2 on Amazon ECS. The Amazon ECS optimized Amazon Linux 2 (Neuron) AMI does not come with the Amazon CLI preinstalled. |
|
Amazon Linux |
Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux AMI |
This AMI is based off of Amazon Linux. We recommend that you migrate your workloads to the Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux 2 AMI. Support for the Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux AMI is the same as the Amazon Linux AMI. For more information, see Amazon Linux AMI. ImportantOn April 15, 2021, the Amazon ECS-optimized Amazon Linux AMI ended its standard support phase and entered a maintenance support phase. In the maintenance support phase, Amazon ECS will continue providing critical and important security updates for a reduced list of packages. During this period, Amazon ECS will no longer add support for new EC2 instance types, new services and features, and new packages. Instead, Amazon ECS will provide updates only for critical and important security fixes that apply to a reduced set of packages. Maintenance support period will end on June 30, 2023. |
Amazon ECS-optimized AMI changelog
Amazon ECS provides a changelog for the Linux variant of the Amazon ECS-optimized AMI on
GitHub. For more information, see Changelog
The Linux variants of the Amazon ECS-optimized AMI use the Amazon Linux 2 AMI or Amazon Linux 2023 AMI
as their base. You can retrieve the Amazon Linux 2 source AMI name or the Amazon Linux 2023 AMI name
for each variant by querying the Systems Manager Parameter Store API. For more information, see
Retrieving Amazon ECS-Optimized AMI
metadata. The Amazon Linux 2 AMI release notes are
available as well. For more information, see Amazon Linux 2 release notes
The following pages provide additional information about the changes:
-
Source AMI release
notes on GitHub -
Docker Engine release notes
in the Docker documentation -
NVIDIA Driver Documentation
in the NVIDIA documentation
-
Amazon ECS Agent changelog
on GitHub The source code for the
ecs-initapplication and the scripts and configuration for packaging the agent are now part of the agent repository. For older versions ofecs-initand packaging, see Amazon ecs-init changelogon GitHub