VPC configuration options

Discrete data centers with redundant power, networking, and connectivity in an Amazon Region. You can use multiple AZs to operate production applications and databases that are more highly available, fault tolerant, and scalable than would be possible from a single data center. If you partition your applications running in subnets across AZs, you are better isolated and protected from issues such as power outages, lightning strikes, tornadoes, and earthquakes.

You must specify IP address ranges for your VPC and subnets. For more information, see IP addressing for your VPCs and subnets.

If you need public IPv4 DNS hostnames for the EC2 instances launched into your subnets, you must enable both of the DNS options. For more information, see DNS attributes for your VPC.

Connects your VPC to the internet. The instances in a public subnet can access the internet because the subnet route table contains a route that sends traffic bound for the internet to the internet gateway. If a server doesn't need to be directly reachable from the internet, you should not deploy it into a public subnet. For more information, see Internet gateways.

The names that you specify for the VPC and the other VPC resources are used to create Name tags. If you use the name tag auto-generation feature in the console, the tag values have the format name-resource.

Enables instances in a private subnet to send outbound traffic to the internet, but prevents resources on the internet from connecting to the instances. In production, we recommend that you deploy a NAT gateway in each active AZ. For more information, see NAT gateways.

Contains a set of rules, called routes, that determine where network traffic from your subnet or gateway is directed. For more information, see Route tables.

A range of IP addresses in your VPC. You can launch Amazon resources, such as EC2 instances, into your subnets. Each subnet resides entirely within one Availability Zone. By launching instances in at least two Availability Zones, you can protect your applications from the failure of a single Availability Zone.

A public subnet has a direct route to an internet gateway. Resources in a public subnet can access the public internet. A private subnet does not have a direct route to an internet gateway. Resources in a private subnet require another component, such as a NAT device, to access the public internet.

For more information, see Subnets.

This option defines if EC2 instances that you launch into the VPC will run on hardware that's shared with other Amazon Web Services accounts or on hardware that's dedicated for your use only. If you choose the tenancy of the VPC to be Default, EC2 instances launched into this VPC will use the tenancy attribute specified when you launch the instance -- For more information, see Launch an instance using defined parameters in the Amazon EC2 User Guide. If you choose the tenancy of the VPC to be Dedicated, the instances will always run as Dedicated Instances on hardware that's dedicated for your use. If you're using Amazon Outposts, your Outpost requires private connectivity; you must use Default tenancy.