AWS: When would you pick S3 over EBS?
The right answer shows you understand *access patterns*, not just storage products.
Question
When would you choose AWS S3 over EBS?
Answer
Pick **S3** when you have **objects** (files, images, logs, backups) that are accessed independently, from many places, over HTTP, and where high durability (11 nines) matters more than millisecond latency. S3 is virtually unlimited, pay-per-GB, and multi-AZ by default. Pick **EBS** when you need a **block device** attached to one EC2 instance at a time — a database's data files, an application's local disk, low-latency random reads/writes, or anything that expects a POSIX filesystem. EBS is bound to a single AZ, sized in fixed GB, and its price includes provisioned IOPS. **In short: S3 for files, EBS for disks.**
See the question and answer above.
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