Welcome
AWS CloudFormation allows you to create and manage AWS infrastructure deployments predictably and repeatedly. You can use CloudFormation to leverage AWS products, such as Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud, Amazon Elastic Block Store, Amazon Simple Notification Service, Elastic Load Balancing, and Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling to build highly reliable, highly scalable, cost-effective applications without creating or configuring the underlying AWS infrastructure.
With CloudFormation, you declare all your resources and dependencies in a template file. The template defines a collection of resources as a single unit called a stack. CloudFormation creates and deletes all member resources of the stack together and manages all dependencies between the resources for you.
For more information about CloudFormation, see the AWS CloudFormation product page
CloudFormation makes use of other AWS products. If you need additional technical information about a specific AWS product, you can find the product's technical documentation at docs.aws.amazon.com.
- Stack actions
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When you use CloudFormation, you manage related resources as a single unit called a stack. You create, update, and delete a collection of resources by creating, updating, and deleting stacks. All the resources in a stack are defined by the stack's template.
CancelUpdateStack | ContinueUpdateRollback | CreateStack | DeleteStack | DescribeStacks | ListStacks | RollbackStack | UpdateStack
Stack events: DescribeStackEvents
Stack resources: DescribeStackResource | DescribeStackResources | ListStackResources
Stack drift: DescribeStackDriftDetectionStatus | DescribeStackResourceDrifts | DetectStackDrift | DetectStackResourceDrift
Stack operations: ListExports | ListImports | SignalResource | UpdateTerminationProtection
Stack policies: GetStackPolicy | SetStackPolicy
Templates: GetTemplate | GetTemplateSummary | ValidateTemplate
- Change set actions
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If you need to make changes to the running resources in a stack, you update the stack. Before making changes to your resources, you can generate a change set, which is summary of your proposed changes. Change sets allow you to see how your changes might impact your running resources, especially for critical resources, before implementing them.
CreateChangeSet | DeleteChangeSet | DescribeChangeSet | DescribeChangeSetHooks | ExecuteChangeSet | ListChangeSets
- StackSets actions
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CloudFormation StackSets lets you create a collection, or stack set, of stacks that can automatically and safely provision a common set of AWS resources across multiple AWS accounts and multiple AWS Regions from a single CloudFormation template. When you create a StackSet, CloudFormation provisions a stack in each of the specified accounts and AWS Regions by using the supplied CloudFormation template and parameters. Stack sets let you manage a common set of AWS resources in a selection of accounts and AWS Regions in a single operation.
CreateStackSet | DeleteStackSet | DescribeStackSet | ListStackSets | UpdateStackSet
Stack instances: CreateStackInstances | DeleteStackInstances | DescribeStackInstance | ListStackInstances
StackSet operations: DescribeStackSetOperation | ListStackSetOperations | ListStackSetOperationResults | StopStackSetOperation
- IaC Generator actions
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Use CloudFormation IaC generator to scan your existing AWS resources and generate CloudFormation templates from them.
For more information, see Generating templates from existing resources in the AWS CloudFormation User Guide.
Generated templates: CreateGeneratedTemplate | DeleteGeneratedTemplate | DescribeGeneratedTemplate | GetGeneratedTemplate | ListGeneratedTemplates | UpdateGeneratedTemplate
Resource scanning: DescribeResourceScan | ListResourceScans | ListResourceScanRelatedResources | ListResourceScanResources | StartResourceScan
- Stack refactoring actions
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Use CloudFormation stack refactoring to move resources between stacks or reorganize your stack architecture.
For more information, see Refactoring stacks in the AWS CloudFormation User Guide.
CreateStackRefactor | DescribeStackRefactor | ExecuteStackRefactor | ListStackRefactors | ListStackRefactorActions
- CloudFormation registry actions
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The CloudFormation registry serves as a centralized hub for managing extensions that can be used with CloudFormation templates, including CloudFormation Hooks, resource types, and modules.
For more information, see Managing extensions with the CloudFormation registry in the AWS CloudFormation User Guide.
Discover and activate: ActivateType | DeactivateType | DescribeType | ListTypes
Configure: BatchDescribeTypeConfigurations | SetTypeConfiguration
Manage versions: ListTypeVersions | SetTypeDefaultVersion
Monitor results: ListHookResults
Register privately: DescribeTypeRegistration | DeregisterType | ListTypeRegistrations | RegisterType
Publish: DescribePublisher | PublishType | RegisterPublisher | TestType
This document was last published on November 12, 2025.
