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What is cloud computing?
Cloud computing is the on-demand delivery of IT resources over the Internet with pay-as-you-go
pricing. Instead of buying, owning, and maintaining physical data centers and servers, you can
access technology services, such as computing power, storage, and databases, on an as-needed
basis from a cloud provider like Amazon Web Services (AWS).
Create an AWS Account

Questions about getting started with AWS? Connect with an expert »

Who is using cloud computing?

Organizations of every type, size, and industry are using the cloud for a wide variety of use cases,
such as data backup, disaster recovery, email, virtual desktops, software development and testing,
big data analytics, and customer-facing web applications. For example, healthcare companies are
using the cloud to develop more personalized treatments for patients. Financial services companies
are using the cloud to power real-time fraud detection and prevention. And video game makers are
using the cloud to deliver online games to millions of players around the world.
 Benefits of cloud computing

Agility
The cloud gives you easy access to a broad range of technologies so that you can innovate faster
and build nearly anything that you can imagine. You can quickly spin up resources as you need
them–from infrastructure services, such as compute, storage, and databases, to Internet of Things,
machine learning, data lakes and analytics, and much more.

You can deploy technology services in a matter of minutes, and get from idea to implementation
several orders of magnitude faster than before. This gives you the freedom to experiment, test new
ideas to differentiate customer experiences, and transform your business.

Elasticity
With cloud computing, you don’t have to over-provision resources up front to handle peak levels of
business activity in the future. Instead, you provision the amount of resources that you actually need.
You can scale these resources up or down to instantly grow and shrink capacity as your business
needs change.
Cost savings
The cloud allows you to trade fixed expenses (such as data centers and physical servers) for
variable expenses, and only pay for IT as you consume it. Plus, the variable expenses are much
lower than what you would pay to do it yourself because of the economies of scale.

Deploy globally in minutes

With the cloud, you can expand to new geographic regions and deploy globally in minutes. For
example, AWS has infrastructure all over the world, so you can deploy your application in multiple
physical locations with just a few clicks. Putting applications in closer proximity to end users reduces
latency and improves their experience.
 Types of cloud computing

The three main types of cloud computing include Infrastructure as a Service, Platform as a Service,
and Software as a Service. Each type of cloud computing provides different levels of control,
flexibility, and management so that you can select the right set of services for your needs.

Learn more

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)

IaaS contains the basic building blocks for cloud IT. It typically provides access to networking
features, computers (virtual or on dedicated hardware), and data storage space. IaaS gives you the
highest level of flexibility and management control over your IT resources. It is most similar to the
existing IT resources with which many IT departments and developers are familiar.

Platform as a Service (PaaS)

PaaS removes the need for you to manage underlying infrastructure (usually hardware and
operating systems), and allows you to focus on the deployment and management of your
applications. This helps you be more efficient as you don’t need to worry about resource
procurement, capacity planning, software maintenance, patching, or any of the other undifferentiated
heavy lifting involved in running your application.
Software as a Service (SaaS)
SaaS provides you with a complete product that is run and managed by the service provider. In most
cases, people referring to SaaS are referring to end-user applications (such as web-based email).
With a SaaS offering, you don’t have to think about how the service is maintained or how the
underlying infrastructure is managed. You only need to think about how you will use that particular
software.

Powering Customer Innovation

Featured Customer Innovations

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 

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 Showing results: 1-4
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BMW Group

Streamlining multilingual business processes and reducing translation time by

over 75%

Coca-Cola

Building a data lake to increase analytics productivity by 80%

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 Epic Games

Creating cutting-edge entertainment for over 350 million players

Netflix

Delivering award-winning entertainment to more than 200 million members

 View All Customer Stories

Cloud services
AWS has more services, and more features within those services, than any other cloud provider,
including compute, storage, databases, networking, data lakes and analytics, machine
learning and artificial intelligence, IoT, security, and much more.
Learn more
Cloud solutions
AWS provides a comprehensive portfolio of solutions that help you solve common problems and
build faster using AWS. Every AWS Solution comes with detailed architecture, a deployment guide,
and instructions for both automated and manual deployment.

Learn more

Learn more about cloud computing on AWS

Pricing

AWS offers a pay-as-you-go approach for pricing.

Pricing for each service is unique.
Learn more

Products

AWS has over 200 fully featured services for a wide range of technologies, industries, and use
cases.
Learn more

Global infrastructure

AWS has the most extensive, reliable, and secure global cloud infrastructure.
Learn more

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