Cost optimization for tables with Intelligent-Tiering

You can automatically optimize storage costs for tables by using S3 Intelligent-Tiering. The S3 Tables Intelligent-Tiering storage class automatically moves data to the most cost-effective access tier when access patterns change. When you use S3 Intelligent-Tiering, data accessed less frequently is automatically moved to lower-cost tiers, and moved back to the Frequent Access tier whenever you access it again.

All data is moved between tiers without retrieval fees, performance impact, or changes to availability. Additionally, table maintenance operations such as compaction are optimized based on access patterns, processing only actively accessed data in the Frequent Access tier while reducing maintenance costs on less frequently accessed data in lower-cost tiers.

S3 Tables Intelligent-Tiering access tiers

When your table is stored in the S3 Intelligent-Tiering storage class, Amazon S3 continuously monitors access patterns and automatically moves table data between access tiers.

Tiering happens at the individual file level, so a single table can have files in different tiers based on access patterns. Table data is automatically moved to one of the following access tiers based on access patterns:

All tiers provide millisecond latency, high throughput performance, and are designed for 99.9% availability and 99.999999999% durability.

Auto-tiering behavior with S3 Intelligent-Tiering

The following actions constitute access that automatically moves files from the Infrequent Access tier or the Archive Instant Access tier back to the Frequent Access tier:

Other actions don't constitute access that automatically moves files from the Infrequent Access tier or the Archive Instant Access tier back to the Frequent Access tier.

Table maintenance behavior

Automatic table maintenance operations performed by Amazon S3, such as snapshot management, unreferenced file removal, and record expiration, continue to run on your tables regardless of tier. Compaction runs only on files in the Frequent Access tier, optimizing performance for frequently accessed data while reducing maintenance costs on data in lower-cost tiers.

Maintenance operations do not affect the access tier of files in your table. Reads performed by maintenance operations do not cause files to change tiers. However, if a maintenance operation, such as compaction or record expiration, writes a new file, that file is created in the Frequent Access tier.

Specifying S3 Intelligent-Tiering as your storage class

By default, all tables are created in the S3 Standard storage class and cannot be moved to S3 Intelligent-Tiering. To use S3 Intelligent-Tiering, you must specify it at table creation. You can also set S3 Intelligent-Tiering as the default storage class for your table bucket to automatically store any new tables created there in the S3 Intelligent-Tiering storage class.

Specifying S3 Intelligent-Tiering for table buckets

You can specify S3 Intelligent-Tiering as the default storage class when creating a new table bucket by using the storage-class-configuration header with the CreateTableBucket operation.

To check the default storage class on an existing table bucket, use the GetTableBucketStorageClass operation. To modify the default storage class of an existing table bucket, use the PutTableBucketStorageClass operation.

Specifying S3 Intelligent-Tiering for tables

You can specify S3 Intelligent-Tiering as the storage class when creating a new table using the storage-class-configuration header with the CreateTable operation.

If you do not specify a storage class at table creation, the table is created in the default storage class configured on the table bucket at that time. Once a table is created, you cannot modify its storage class.

To check the default storage class on an existing table bucket, use the GetTableBucketStorageClass operation.

Monitoring storage usage

You can view your storage usage breakdown by access tier in the AWS Cost and Usage Reports for your account. For more information, see Creating Cost and Usage Reports in the AWS Data Exports User Guide.

The following usage types are available in your billing reports: