Working with queues in AWS Elemental MediaConvert - MediaConvert
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Working with queues in AWS Elemental MediaConvert

A queue is a set of resources that processes jobs. All jobs run in a queue.

To start a job, you submit it to a queue. AWS Elemental MediaConvert processes jobs that you submit to a queue in parallel. When all of your queue's resources are used, additional jobs stay in a SUBMITTED state until your queue's resources become available again. Use queues to manage the resources that are available to your account, to process multiple jobs concurrently, and to prioritize some jobs when needed.

MediaConvert offers the following two queue types:

On-demand queues

With on-demand queues, you don't have to set up anything in advance. Your default queue is an on-demand queue. You pay rates that depend on the features that you use. For more information, see MediaConvert Pricing.

Reserved queues

With reserved queues, you pay for the transcoding capacity of the entire queue, regardless of how much or how little you use it. For more information, see MediaConvert Pricing.

If you don't specify a queue when you create your job, MediaConvert sends it to the default on-demand queue.

For information about how many queues you can create and how many jobs those queues can run, see Service quotas in the Amazon General Reference Guide.

You can set up your job to move from one queue to another automatically if it stays in a SUBMITTED state for too long. For more information, see Moving a job to a different queue.

The time to complete a job varies significantly according to your input files and job settings. Accordingly, MediaConvert doesn't always complete jobs in the same order that you submit them.

How to specify a queue for your job

You specify a job's queue when you submit your job. The following tabs show different options for specifying a queue for your job.

Console

To specify a queue for your job by using the MediaConvert console, complete these steps:

  1. Open the Create job page in the MediaConvert console.

  2. Choose Job management from the Job settings menu.

  3. Under Queue, choose a queue.

API, SDK, or the Amazon CLI

To specify a job's queue by using the API, SDK, or the Amazon Command Line Interface (Amazon CLI), specify the Queue property. This property is a direct child of Jobs, which is in the top level of the JSON job specification. Set Queue to the ARN of your queue.

The following is an excerpt of a job settings JSON with an example queue specified.

{
	"Settings": {
		"OutputGroups": [...],
		"Inputs": [...]
	},
	"Queue": "arn:aws:mediaconvert:us-west-2:111122223333:queues/example"
}

For more information, see the MediaConvert API Reference.

The following topics provide information about how queues work in general, and about each type of queue specifically.

Topics