# AWS Decision Guides Decision guides provide structured comparisons and guidance to help you evaluate AWS services, understand the criteria that inform your choices, and select the best options for your workloads. ## Featured content - [Choosing a purchasing option for Amazon EC2](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/ec2-purchasing-options-aws-how-to-choose.html): Compare On-Demand Instances, Reserved Instances, Savings Plans, and Spot Instances to optimize cost and performance for your EC2 workloads. **Last updated: July 2025** - [AWS Fargate or Lambda?](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/fargate-or-lambda.html): Understand the differences between serverless containers and serverless functions to pick the right compute model. **Last updated: September 2024** - [Amazon Bedrock or Amazon SageMaker?](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/bedrock-or-sagemaker.html): Understand when to use Amazon Bedrock for building AI-powered applications versus Amazon SageMaker for custom model development. **Last updated: July 2026** ## Decision guides by technology Browse all decision guides organized by AWS technology category. ## Compute Choose the right AWS compute service for your modern app development. Whether you need virtual machines, containers, or serverless functions, this category helps you match your workload requirements to the right service. - [Choosing an AWS compute service](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/choosing-aws-compute-service.html): Compare compute options including virtual machines, containers, and serverless to find the right fit for your workload. **Last updated: May 2025** - [Choosing an AWS container service](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/choosing-aws-container-service.html): Evaluate container orchestration options and choose between managed services for running containerized applications. **Last updated: May 2025** - [AWS Fargate or Lambda?](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/fargate-or-lambda.html): Understand the differences between serverless containers and serverless functions to pick the right compute model. **Last updated: September 2024** - [Amazon Lightsail, Elastic Beanstalk, or EC2?](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/lightsail-elastic-beanstalk-ec2.html): Compare simplified, managed, and full-control compute options for deploying web applications. **Last updated: May 2025** - [Choosing a modern application strategy](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/modern-apps-strategy-on-aws-how-to-choose.html): Evaluate approaches to modernizing your applications, including microservices, event-driven architectures, and serverless patterns. **Last updated: March 2025** - [Choosing a purchasing option for Amazon EC2](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/ec2-purchasing-options-aws-how-to-choose.html): Compare On-Demand Instances, Reserved Instances, Savings Plans, and Spot Instances to optimize cost and performance for your EC2 workloads. **Last updated: July 2025** ## Storage & Databases Choose the right AWS storage or database service for your data. AWS offers block, file, object, and cache storage options, plus purpose-built databases for relational, key-value, document, graph, and other data models. - [Choosing an AWS database service](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/databases-on-aws-how-to-choose.html): Evaluate relational, key-value, document, graph, and other purpose-built database services to match your data model. **Last updated: June 2025** - [Choosing an AWS storage service](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/choosing-aws-storage-service.html): Compare block, file, and object storage services to choose the right storage solution for your data access patterns. **Last updated: April 2025** ## Machine Learning Choose AWS services for AI and machine learning workloads. ML provides tools to learn from data, identify patterns, and make predictions. Use these guides to choose the right service for generative AI, model training, or ML inference. - [Choosing a generative AI service](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/genai-guide.html): Evaluate services for building generative AI applications, including foundation models, model customization, and AI agents. **Last updated: February 2025** - [Choosing an AWS machine learning service](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/ml-guide.html): Compare services for training, deploying, and managing machine learning models at scale. **Last updated: December 2024** - [Amazon Bedrock or Amazon SageMaker?](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/bedrock-or-sagemaker.html): Understand when to use Amazon Bedrock for building AI-powered applications versus Amazon SageMaker for custom model development. **Last updated: July 2026** ## Security, Identity, & Compliance AWS offers tools and services across five domains to help you achieve and maintain robust security. Use these guides to choose services for protecting workloads, managing identities, and meeting compliance requirements. - [Choosing AWS security, identity, and governance services](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/choosing-aws-security-services.html): Evaluate services for protecting workloads, managing access, and meeting compliance requirements. **Last updated: June 2025** - [Choosing an AWS identity service](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/identity-on-aws-how-to-choose.html): Compare identity services for managing authentication, authorization, and user access. **Last updated: June 2025** - [Choosing an AWS cryptography service](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/guide.html): Evaluate encryption key management, hardware security modules, and certificate services. **Last updated: January 2025** - [AWS WAF or Shield?](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/waf-or-shield.html): Choose between web application firewall and DDoS protection services. **Last updated: September 2024** ## Management & Governance Choose AWS monitoring, observability, governance, and cost management services. These guides help you select the tools that are the best fit for maintaining visibility into workload health and optimizing cloud spending. - [Choosing an AWS monitoring and observability service](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/monitoring-on-aws-how-to-choose.html): Compare monitoring, logging, and observability services to maintain visibility into workload health. **Last updated: March 2025** - [AWS CloudTrail or CloudWatch?](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/cloudtrail-or-cloudwatch.html): Understand the differences between audit logging and operational monitoring. **Last updated: September 2024** - [Choosing an AWS cloud governance service](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/cloud-governance-on-aws-how-to-choose.html): Evaluate services for enforcing policies, managing compliance, and governing resources. **Last updated: March 2025** - [Choosing an AWS cost management strategy](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/cost-management-on-aws-how-to-choose.html): Compare tools and strategies for optimizing cloud spending, tracking costs, and managing budgets. **Last updated: March 2025** ## Networking & Content Delivery Choose the networking and content delivery services that fit your needs. This guide helps you ask the right questions about connectivity, security, and performance for your network architecture. - [Choosing an AWS networking and content delivery service](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/choosing-networking-and-content-delivery-service.html): Evaluate networking services including VPCs, load balancers, CDNs, VPNs, and hybrid connectivity options. **Last updated: March 2025** ## Analytics Build your modern data architecture on AWS. This guide helps you break down data silos by connecting your data lake and data warehouses, and put data in the hands of everyone in your organization. - [Choosing an AWS analytics service](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/analytics-on-aws-how-to-choose.html): Compare data lake, data warehouse, streaming, and business intelligence services for your data workloads. **Last updated: April 2025** ## Application Integration Choose the right integration services for your workloads. This guide helps you discover your requirements and provides clear guidance on evaluating messaging, event-driven, and workflow services. - [Choosing an AWS application integration service](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/application-integration-on-aws-how-to-choose.html): Evaluate services for connecting applications through messaging, events, workflows, and API management. **Last updated: March 2025** - [Amazon SQS, SNS, or EventBridge?](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/sns-or-sqs-or-eventbridge.html): Understand the differences between queuing, pub/sub, and event bus services. **Last updated: September 2024** ## Migration & IoT Choose the right tools for migrating workloads to AWS or building IoT solutions. AWS offers tools for diverse migration strategies and purpose-built IoT services for device connectivity, data ingestion, and edge inference. - [Choosing AWS migration services and tools](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/migration-on-aws-how-to-choose.html): Evaluate migration tools based on your workload type, migration strategy, and timeline. **Last updated: March 2025** - [Choosing an AWS IoT service](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/iot.html): Compare IoT services for connecting devices, processing data at the edge, and building end-to-end IoT solutions. **Last updated: December 2024** ## Front-End Web & Mobile Build your web or mobile app on AWS. This guide helps you explore business requirements and guides you through the architecture and hosting decisions you'll need to make. - [Choosing AWS frontend web and mobile services](/decision-guides/latest/decision-guides/front-end-mobile.html): Evaluate services for building, deploying, and hosting frontend web and mobile applications with authentication, APIs, and hosting. **Last updated: March 2025** ## Related information Explore additional AWS resources for getting started, architecture best practices, and implementation guidance. - [Getting Started Resource Center](/getting-started/): Hands-on tutorials, learning resources, and tools to help you get started with AWS. - [Architecture Center](https://aws.amazon.com/architecture/): Reference architecture diagrams, vetted solutions, and best practices for building on AWS. - [Prescriptive Guidance](/prescriptive-guidance/latest/guides/guides.html): Strategies, guides, and patterns to help accelerate your cloud migration and modernization projects. ---