# Performance efficiency
Performance efficiency

The performance efficiency pillar includes the ability to use cloud resources efficiently to meet performance requirements, and to maintain that efficiency as demand changes and technologies evolve.

 The performance efficiency pillar provides an overview of design principles, best practices, and questions. You can find prescriptive guidance on implementation in the [Performance Efficiency Pillar whitepaper](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/wellarchitected/latest/performance-efficiency-pillar/welcome.html?ref=wellarchitected-wp). 

**Topics**
+ [

# Design principles
](perf-dp.md)
+ [

# Definition
](perf-def.md)
+ [

# Best practices
](perf-bp.md)
+ [

# Resources
](perf-resources.md)

# Design principles


 There are five design principles for performance efficiency in the cloud: 
+  **Democratize advanced technologies**: Make advanced technology implementation smoother for your team by delegating complex tasks to your cloud vendor. Rather than asking your IT team to learn about hosting and running a new technology, consider consuming the technology as a service. For example, NoSQL databases, media transcoding, and machine learning are all technologies that require specialized expertise. In the cloud, these technologies become services that your team can consume, permitting your team to focus on product development rather than resource provisioning and management. 
+  **Go global in minutes**: Deploying your workload in multiple AWS Regions around the world permits you to provide lower latency and a better experience for your customers at minimal cost. 
+  **Use serverless architectures**: Serverless architectures remove the need for you to run and maintain physical servers for traditional compute activities. For example, serverless storage services can act as static websites (removing the need for web servers) and event services can host code. This removes the operational burden of managing physical servers, and can lower transactional costs because managed services operate at cloud scale. 
+  **Experiment more often**: With virtual and automatable resources, you can quickly carry out comparative testing using different types of instances, storage, or configurations. 
+  **Consider mechanical sympathy**: Understand how cloud services are consumed and always use the technology approach that aligns with your workload goals. For example, consider data access patterns when you select database or storage approaches. 

# Definition


 There are five best practice areas for performance efficiency in the cloud: 
+  **Architecture selection** 
+  **Compute and hardware** 
+  **Data management** 
+  **Networking and content delivery** 
+  **Process and culture** 

 Take a data-driven approach to building a high-performance architecture. Gather data on all aspects of the architecture, from the high-level design to the selection and configuration of resource types. 

 Reviewing your choices on a regular basis validates that you are taking advantage of the continually evolving AWS Cloud. Monitoring verifies that you are aware of any deviance from expected performance. Make trade-offs in your architecture to improve performance, such as using compression or caching, or relaxing consistency requirements. 

# Best practices


**Topics**
+ [

# Architecture selection
](perf-arch.md)
+ [

# Compute and hardware
](perf-compute.md)
+ [

# Data management
](perf-data.md)
+ [

# Networking and content delivery
](perf-networking.md)
+ [

# Process and culture
](perf-process.md)

# Architecture selection


 The optimal solution for a particular workload varies, and solutions often combine multiple approaches. Well-Architected workloads use multiple solutions and allow different features to improve performance. 

 AWS resources are available in many types and configurations, which makes it easier to find an approach that closely matches your needs. You can also find options that are not easily achievable with on-premises infrastructure. For example, a managed service such as Amazon DynamoDB provides a fully managed NoSQL database with single-digit millisecond latency at any scale. 

 The following question focuses on these considerations for performance efficiency. (For a list of performance efficiency questions and best practices, see the [Appendix](a-performance-efficiency.md).). 


| PERF 1:  How do you select appropriate cloud resources and architecture patterns for your workload? | 
| --- | 
|  Often, multiple approaches are required for more effective performance across a workload. Well-Architected systems use multiple solutions and features to improve performance.  | 

# Compute and hardware


 The optimal compute choice for a particular workload can vary based on application design, usage patterns, and configuration settings. Architectures may use different compute choices for various components and allow different features to improve performance. Selecting the wrong compute choice for an architecture can lead to lower performance efficiency. 

 In AWS, compute is available in three forms: instances, containers, and functions: 
+  **Instances** are virtualized servers, permitting you to change their capabilities with a button or an API call. Because resource decisions in the cloud aren’t fixed, you can experiment with different server types. At AWS, these virtual server instances come in different families and sizes, and they offer a wide variety of capabilities, including solid-state drives (SSDs) and graphics processing units (GPUs). 
+  **Containers** are a method of operating system virtualization that permit you to run an application and its dependencies in resource-isolated processes. AWS Fargate is serverless compute for containers or Amazon EC2 can be used if you need control over the installation, configuration, and management of your compute environment. You can also choose from multiple container orchestration platforms: Amazon Elastic Container Service (ECS) or Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (EKS). 
+  **Functions** abstract the run environment from the code you want to apply. For example, AWS Lambda permits you to run code without running an instance. 

 The following question focuses on these considerations for performance efficiency. 


| PERF 2:  How do you select and use compute resources in your workload? | 
| --- | 
| The more efficient compute solution for a workload varies based on application design, usage patterns, and configuration settings. Architectures can use different compute solutions for various components and turn on different features to improve performance. Selecting the wrong compute solution for an architecture can lead to lower performance efficiency. | 

# Data management


 The optimal data management solution for a particular system varies based on the kind of data type (block, file, or object), access patterns (random or sequential), required throughput, frequency of access (online, offline, archival), frequency of update (WORM, dynamic), and availability and durability constraints. Well-Architected workloads use purpose-built data stores which allow different features to improve performance. 

 In AWS, storage is available in three forms: object, block, and file: 
+  **Object storage** provides a scalable, durable platform to make data accessible from any internet location for user-generated content, active archive, serverless computing, Big Data storage or backup and recovery. Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) is an object storage service that offers industry-leading scalability, data availability, security, and performance. Amazon S3 is designed for 99.999999999% (11 9's) of durability, and stores data for millions of applications for companies all around the world. 
+  **Block storage** provides highly available, consistent, low-latency block storage for each virtual host and is analogous to direct-attached storage (DAS) or a Storage Area Network (SAN). Amazon Elastic Block Store (Amazon EBS) is designed for workloads that require persistent storage accessible by EC2 instances that helps you tune applications with the right storage capacity, performance and cost. 
+  **File storage** provides access to a shared file system across multiple systems. File storage solutions like Amazon Elastic File System (Amazon EFS) are ideal for use cases such as large content repositories, development environments, media stores, or user home directories. Amazon FSx makes it efficient and cost effective to launch and run popular file systems so you can leverage the rich feature sets and fast performance of widely used open source and commercially-licensed file systems. 

 The following question focuses on these considerations for performance efficiency. 


| PERF 3:  How do you store, manage, and access data in your workload? | 
| --- | 
|  The more efficient storage solution for a system varies based on the kind of access operation (block, file, or object), patterns of access (random or sequential), required throughput, frequency of access (online, offline, archival), frequency of update (WORM, dynamic), and availability and durability constraints. Well-architected systems use multiple storage solutions and turn on different features to improve performance and use resources efficiently.  | 

# Networking and content delivery


 The optimal networking solution for a workload varies based on latency, throughput requirements, jitter, and bandwidth. Physical constraints, such as user or on-premises resources, determine location options. These constraints can be offset with edge locations or resource placement. 

 On AWS, networking is virtualized and is available in a number of different types and configurations. This makes it easier to match your networking needs. AWS offers product features (for example, Enhanced Networking, Amazon EC2 networking optimized instances, Amazon S3 transfer acceleration, and dynamic Amazon CloudFront) to optimize network traffic. AWS also offers networking features (for example, Amazon Route 53 latency routing, Amazon VPC endpoints, AWS Direct Connect, and AWS Global Accelerator) to reduce network distance or jitter. 

 The following question focuses on these considerations for performance efficiency. 


| PERF 4:  How do you select and configure networking resources in your workload? | 
| --- | 
|  This question includes guidance and best practices to design, configure, and operate efficient networking and content delivery solutions in the cloud.  | 

# Process and culture


 When architecting workloads, there are principles and practices that you can adopt to help you better run efficient high-performing cloud workloads. To adopt a culture that fosters performance efficiency of cloud workloads, consider these key principles and practices. 

 Consider these key principles to build this culture: 
+  **Infrastructure as code:** Define your infrastructure as code using approaches such as AWS CloudFormation templates. The use of templates allows you to place your infrastructure into source control alongside your application code and configurations. This allows you to apply the same practices you use to develop software in your infrastructure so you can iterate rapidly. 
+  **Deployment pipeline:** Use a continuous integration/continuous deployment (CI/CD) pipeline (for example, source code repository, build systems, deployment, and testing automation) to deploy your infrastructure. This allows you to deploy in a repeatable, consistent, and low-cost fashion as you iterate. 
+  **Well-defined metrics:** Set up and monitor metrics to capture key performance indicators (KPIs). We recommend that you use both technical and business metrics. For websites or mobile apps, key metrics are capturing time-to-first-byte or rendering. Other generally applicable metrics include thread count, garbage collection rate, and wait states. Business metrics, such as the aggregate cumulative cost per request, can alert you to ways to drive down costs. Carefully consider how you plan to interpret metrics. For example, you could choose the maximum or 99th percentile instead of the average. 
+  **Performance test automatically:** As part of your deployment process, automatically start performance tests after the quicker running tests have passed successfully. The automation should create a new environment, set up initial conditions such as test data, and then run a series of benchmarks and load tests. Results from these tests should be tied back to the build so you can track performance changes over time. For long-running tests, you can make this part of the pipeline asynchronous from the rest of the build. Alternatively, you could run performance tests overnight using Amazon EC2 Spot Instances. 
+  **Load generation:** You should create a series of test scripts that replicate synthetic or prerecorded user journeys. These scripts should be idempotent and not coupled, and you might need to include *pre-warming* scripts to yield valid results. As much as possible, your test scripts should replicate the behavior of usage in production. You can use software or software-as-a-service (SaaS) solutions to generate the load. Consider using [AWS Marketplace](https://aws.amazon.com/marketplace/) solutions and [Spot Instances](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/using-spot-instances.html) — they can be cost-effective ways to generate the load. 
+  **Performance visibility:** Key metrics should be visible to your team, especially metrics against each build version. This allows you to see any significant positive or negative trend over time. You should also display metrics on the number of errors or exceptions to make sure you are testing a working system. 
+ **Visualization:** Use visualization techniques that make it clear where performance issues, hot spots, wait states, or low utilization is occurring. Overlay performance metrics over architecture diagrams — call graphs or code can help identify issues quickly. 
+  **Regular review process:** Architectures performing poorly is usually the result of a non-existent or broken performance review process. If your architecture is performing poorly, implementing a performance review process allows you to drive iterative improvement. 
+  **Continual optimization:** Adopt a culture to continually optimize the performance efficiency of your cloud workload. 

 The following question focuses on these considerations for performance efficiency. 


| PERF 5:  What process do you use to support more performance efficiency for your workload?  | 
| --- | 
|  When architecting workloads, there are principles and practices that you can adopt to help you better run efficient high-performing cloud workloads. To adopt a culture that fosters performance efficiency of cloud workloads, consider these key principles and practices.  | 

# Resources


 Refer to the following resources to learn more about our best practices for Performance Efficiency. 

## Documentation

+  [Amazon S3 Performance Optimization](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonS3/latest/dev/PerformanceOptimization.html?ref=wellarchitected-wp) 
+  [Amazon EBS Volume Performance](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/EBSPerformance.html?ref=wellarchitected-wp) 

## Whitepaper

+  [Performance Efficiency Pillar](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/wellarchitected/latest/performance-efficiency-pillar/welcome.html?ref=wellarchitected-wp) 

## Video

+  [AWS re:Invent 2019: Amazon EC2 foundations (CMP211-R2)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMMybKqC2Y0&ref=wellarchitected-wp) 
+  [AWS re:Invent 2019: Leadership session: Storage state of the union (STG201-L)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=39vAsGi6eEI&ref=wellarchitected-wp) 
+  [AWS re:Invent 2019: Leadership session: AWS purpose-built databases (DAT209-L)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q81TVuV5u28&ref=wellarchitected-wp) 
+  [AWS re:Invent 2019: Connectivity to AWS and hybrid AWS network architectures (NET317-R1)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqW6CPb58gs&ref=wellarchitected-wp) 
+  [AWS re:Invent 2019: Powering next-gen Amazon EC2: Deep dive into the Nitro system (CMP303-R2)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUY-00yFlE4&ref=wellarchitected-wp) 
+  [AWS re:Invent 2019: Scaling up to your first 10 million users (ARC211-R)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKjm4ehYiMs&ref=wellarchitected-wp)