Amazon ElastiCache Reserved Nodes give you the option to make a low, one-time payment for each cache node you want to reserve and in turn receive a significant discount on the hourly charge for that Node. Amazon ElastiCache provides three ElastiCache Reserved Node types (All Upfront, No Upfront, and Partial Upfront Reserved Instances) that enable you to balance the amount you pay upfront with your effective hourly price. Based on your application workload and the amount of time you plan to run them; Amazon ElastiCache Reserved Nodes may provide substantial savings over running on-demand Nodes.

  • Reserved Cache Nodes for current node families are available with All Upfront, No Upfront, and Partial Upfront options. Reserved Cache Nodes from previous generation cache node families are available in three different types: Light, Medium, and Heavy Utilization.
  • Reserved Cache Nodes are easy to use and require no change to how you use Amazon ElastiCache. When computing your bill, our system will automatically apply Reserved Cache Node rates first to minimize your costs. A cache node hour will only be charged at the On-Demand rate when the total number of cache nodes you run that hour exceeds the number of applicable Reserved Cache Nodes you own.
  • Reserved Cache Nodes can be purchased for one or three year terms.
  • Reserved Cache Nodes are available in all the AWS regions.
  • Reserved Cache Nodes are available for both Redis and Memcached.
  • Pricing for Reserved Cache Nodes is available on the Amazon ElastiCache Pricing Page.

For latest generation nodes (M5, R5 onwards), you can choose between three payment options when you purchase a Reserved Instance. With the All Upfront option, you pay for the entire Reserved Instance with one upfront payment. This option provides you with the largest discount compared to On-Demand Instance pricing. With the Partial Upfront option, you make a low upfront payment and are then charged a discounted hourly rate for the instance for the duration of the Reserved Instance term. The No Upfront option does not require any upfront payment and provides a discounted hourly rate for the duration of the term.

  • No Upfront RI offers up to a 48.2% discount compared to on-demand and does not require an upfront payment. For every hour in the term, you are charged an hourly rate that is lower than on-demand charge.
  • Partial Upfront RI balances the payments of an RI between All Upfront and hourly charges by providing a discount of up to 52% as compared to on-demand charges. For every hour in the term, you are charged an hourly rate that is lower than on-demand or No Upfront hourly rate.
  • All Upfront RI offers the highest discount, up to 55% off, compared to on-demand billing. There are no additional usage fees for the hours used during the term.

For older nodes types (T2, M3, M4, R3, R4), ElastiCache offers Heavy Utilization Reserved Instances. Heavy Utilization Reserved Cache Nodes are appropriate for your steady-state production workloads that will be always running, so you commit to the entire duration of the Reserved Cache Node term. With this Reserved Cache Node, you pay a higher upfront payment than Medium Utilization Reserved Cache Nodes and the lowest hourly usage fee. You are charged this low hourly rate for every hour in the Reserved Cache Node term you purchase.

Current cache node families support Heavy Utilization only. Previous generation cache nodes support Light, Medium and Heavy Utilization. If you are looking for T1, M1, M2, or C1 Cache Nodes, please see the Previous Generation Cache Nodes page.  

Customers using both Reserved and On-Demand Cache Nodes will have Reserved Cache Node rates applied first to minimize costs. Each hour, if the number of running cache nodes is less than or equal to the number of applicable Reserved Cache Nodes you have, all running cache nodes will be charged at the Reserved Cache Node hourly rate. When your total quantity of running cache nodes exceeds the number of applicable Reserved Cache Nodes you own, you will be charged the On-Demand rate.

For example, if you own 3 Reserved Cache Nodes with the same Cache Node type in a given region, the billing system checks each hour to see how many total cache nodes you have running that match those parameters. If it is 3 or less, you will be charged the Reserved Cache Node Rate for each cache node running that hour. If more than 3 are running, you will be charged the On-Demand rate for the additional Cache Nodes.

If you purchase a Reserved Cache Node in a given region where you have a running Cache Node, the lower hourly charge will automatically be applied to that cache node moving forward with no need to restart.

Reserved Cache Nodes can be purchased using the AWS Management Console or API tools.

  1. Log in to the AWS Management Console, click the “Amazon ElastiCache” tab
  2. Select the Region in which you would like to make your Reserved Cache Node purchases
  3. Select “Reserved Cache Nodes” in the navigation pane and click on the “Purchase Reserved Cache Node” button
  4. Select the cache node class and the term length
  5. Adjust the quantity of cache nodes to purchase
  6. Click on “Continue”, verify the purchase information, and confirm

Please refer to Amazon ElastiCache Documentation for information about using the API tools.

  • Region, Cache Node Class, and term length must be chosen at purchase, and cannot be changed later.
  • You can purchase up to 300 Reserved Cache Nodes. If you need additional Reserved Cache Nodes, complete the form found here.
  • The one-time fee is non-refundable.