Using a flexible cloud OS has reduced licensing costs and has supported large-scale load testing
What is our primary use case?
My main use case for Amazon Linux is as load test injectors VMs. I use Amazon Linux as a load test injector VM by spinning up a number of instances in AWS using this or using auto-scaling. For our requirement, we required RHEL-based systems and servers, which is why we are using Amazon Linux.
For a load injector, we are using a number of servers, mainly 10 to 20 servers. If we were going for RHEL, it would require a 10-server subscription. However, we are using Amazon Linux, which is freeware and does not require any subscription. Additionally, it belongs to the RHEL family and is easily integrated with all the AWS services.
What is most valuable?
The best feature of Amazon Linux is that it can easily integrate with all the services in AWS. The easy integration with AWS services helps me in my day-to-day work because if we are choosing any RHEL or Ubuntu-based server in AWS, we are required to install a service manager on that server. However, if we are using Amazon Linux, it is not required to install that type of package on it.
Amazon Linux has impacted my organization positively because, as I mentioned, we are using it as a load injector, and for this, our client required an RHEL-based OS. If we are using RHEL machines or servers, it requires an RHEL subscription. However, for Amazon Linux, no subscription is required. It is freeware, so it is cost-effective for our organization.
What needs improvement?
I have not felt any lag or any performance issues on Amazon Linux, so it does not require any improvement from my perspective. I do not have anything I wish Amazon Linux would do differently or features I would like to see added in the future.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Amazon Linux for around five plus years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Amazon Linux's scalability is good. I have used it in an auto-scaling group for some time, and it is more scalable and more flexible and reliable.
How are customer service and support?
The customer support is awesome because it belongs to AWS, and AWS customer support is excellent.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I have not yet used a different solution.
How was the initial setup?
I did not purchase Amazon Linux through the AWS Marketplace.
What was our ROI?
I have seen a return on investment because it saves money. As I mentioned, if we required RHEL servers, it needs some subscriptions. However, for using Amazon Linux, it is freeware, and it saves us a lot of money.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
Before choosing Amazon Linux, I did not evaluate any other options.
What other advice do I have?
I would add that it is freeware for RHEL machines and belongs to the RHEL family. I chose 8 out of 10 for my review rating because for the RHEL family, I am using Amazon Linux, but sometimes, if we are using OpenShift or something that requires an RHEL subscription, then we are required to have an RHEL subscription or RHEL OS. Apart from that, we can easily use Amazon Linux.
I would advise that if your company and if your client is required to have an RHEL-based OS on AWS, you must go for Amazon Linux because it easily integrates with all the services and belongs to AWS, and it is freeware for RHEL.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Private Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Performance monitoring has improved reliability and cuts costs in my daily cloud workload
What is our primary use case?
I use Amazon Linux in my day-to-day work as a performance test engineer to monitor performance-related issues. For my cloud environment, which is AWS, most of my servers are EC2 instances, so I identify CPU utilization, memory usage on EC2 instances, and services. I am using Performance Insight, AWS CloudWatch, and RDS.
What is most valuable?
The best features Amazon Linux offers in my experience are the security of all updates and its ease of use, particularly in terms of performance.
Amazon Linux has positively impacted my organization by reducing costs, improving reliability, and saving time by scanning all AWS services and basically integrating all the services.
What needs improvement?
I think Amazon Linux can be improved, but I have no specific suggestions.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Amazon Linux for four years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The scalability of Amazon Linux is flexible, and I basically use it for multiple load balancers.
How are customer service and support?
The customer support for Amazon Linux is good.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I did not previously use a different solution.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing is that the setup cost is freeware, which results in no cost setup, thereby saving money.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
Before choosing Amazon Linux, I did not evaluate other options, as I am comfortable with my choice.
What other advice do I have?
My advice to others looking into using Amazon Linux is that if you require a RHEL-based OS, you must use it. I gave this product a rating of 9.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Cloud migration has boosted performance and now supports faster, flexible deployments
What is our primary use case?
I have been using Amazon Linux from my company for the last five years. We deploy Amazon Linux to most of our cloud servers, such as Apache, Nginx, and sometimes Kubernetes boxes. In a recent project, we used Terraform to deploy Amazon Linux and then used it to deploy one MySQL server. We explicitly deployed the MySQL database using Amazon Linux and then used Terraform to configure the deployment along with user data to perform post-implementation tasks, including installing packages, updating packages, and configuring user accounts. These are the general use cases we implemented.
What is most valuable?
Amazon Linux has impacted my organization very positively. Initially, we used to host on-premises servers, but now we have moved to Amazon Cloud and instead of using other distributions, we use Amazon Linux. It is very lightweight and provides all the packages needed, making it easy to customize and deploy.
Amazon Linux is a very lightweight operating system compared to others. We do not need a separate subscription to use Amazon Linux, and we have access to a good repository that provides many packages we can use in our day-to-day operations. Almost everything I need can be obtained from the packages when it comes to the lightweight nature of Amazon Linux. It uses very few resources from the operating system standpoint, and the remaining resources can technically be used for my applications.
These images are managed by Amazon, which helps us reduce the maintenance of the operating systems. Amazon Linux has good scalability. If we use different services from Amazon to provide scalable solutions, we can have multi-AZ setups or multi-region setups as well, which provides good scalability.
Customer support for Amazon Linux is really good. Whenever I need anything, I raise a support case and receive support on priority. I would rate the customer support for Amazon Linux on a scale of one to ten as nine.
What needs improvement?
Amazon Linux has almost everything, but there are some tools and libraries missing when we receive this operating system. If those tools and libraries could be installed with it, that would be much better.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been working in my current field for more than seven to eight years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Amazon Linux has good scalability. If we use different services from Amazon to provide scalable solutions, we can have multi-AZ setups or multi-region setups as well, which provides good scalability.
How are customer service and support?
Customer support for Amazon Linux is really good. Whenever I need anything, I raise a support case and receive support on priority.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I initially used different distributions like Ubuntu and CentOS. However, these AMIs are well maintained and well supported, which is why I am using Amazon Linux now.
How was the initial setup?
I purchased Amazon Linux from the Marketplace and had quite a good experience regarding pricing, setup cost, and licensing.
What about the implementation team?
I directly went and tried Amazon Linux without evaluating other options.
What was our ROI?
I am not sure about the exact number because I am from the operations side, not from the financial side. However, when it comes to performance, Amazon Linux really helped my team and my organization to deploy instances much faster compared to other operating systems. I would say it helped me save on maintenance and some cost as well.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
I purchased Amazon Linux from the Marketplace and had quite a good experience regarding pricing, setup cost, and licensing.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
I directly went and tried Amazon Linux without evaluating other options.
What other advice do I have?
I would rate the customer support for Amazon Linux on a scale of one to ten as nine. Because there are some improvements needed which I already mentioned, I think eight would be the right rating.
Amazon Linux has almost everything. The only part is that there are some tools and libraries missing when we receive this operating system. If those tools and libraries could be installed with it, that would be much better.
I use AWS and Azure as my cloud providers. This is a good operating system to use when it comes to public cloud because it is mainly used for the Amazon platform. It provides good scalability and good performance and also helps with cost-saving aspects. My overall rating for this review is eight.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Flexible cloud workloads have unified development, testing, and database workflows
What is our primary use case?
My use case for Amazon Linux includes web and application hosting, microservices, container, database management, and virtual desktop services.
I use Amazon Linux as a lightweight base image for Docker containers and power nodes for Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Services and Amazon Elastic Container Services. For database management, I use PostgreSQL, MariaDB, and MySQL for Jupyter Notebook and R services.
I use Amazon Linux for LQs with our IT data center. I deploy different flavors of Amazon Linux so that all applications can be deployed on that particular Amazon Linux environment. My team members use it for services use cases during the development and testing process.
I use MySQL and MariaDB services with Amazon Linux, which makes the workflow smoother for my testing and developer team.
I use Amazon Linux for testing, development, and staging environments. Different teams work in those particular fields. For the Java environment, the database environment, and the staging environment, my team is organized in a positive way.
What is most valuable?
Amazon Linux is freeware. The key benefits include integration, pre-installed tools for the AWS System Manager, EC2 instance connection directly via PuTTY, and it is lightweight and scalable. There is no additional licensing cost for Amazon Linux, so my organization sees 20% to 40% better performance when migrating from a paid distribution such as RHEL. This enhances performance and contributes to cost-cutting.
It is very reliable for me and my organization, and the licensing is beneficial for us.
Amazon Linux provides both money and time savings.
It provides native AWS integration, optimized performance, enhanced security, and is cost-effective. My advice to others is that Amazon Linux is the best way to develop business and solutions.
What needs improvement?
I believe there is no need to improve Amazon Linux. It is definitely working in a very progressive and highly scalable way.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been working with Amazon Linux for the last three years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
I would rate the stability as eight out of ten and ten out of ten.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Amazon Linux has long-time support provided. For security, Amazon Linux is most scalable.
What other advice do I have?
I will provide a rating of eight for Amazon Linux.
I am using a long-term support version of Amazon Linux, so there is no need for any other features.
Amazon Linux provides different types of services that can be installed for DevOps automation, high-performance computing, virtual desktops, database management, microservices, containerization, and web services hosting. For all of these capabilities, I have provided a rating of eight out of ten. My overall review rating for Amazon Linux is eight out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Security-first platform has improved compliance and saves costs with faster, consistent deployments
What is our primary use case?
Amazon Linux has been our go-to distribution for about two years in our organization for hosting our web application and managing our
EC2 instances.
Day-to-day, we primarily use Amazon Linux for our application deployments. We mainly use Amazon Linux to manage our Nginx web servers and handle our routine security patching via the DNF package manager. We spend considerable time writing Bash scripts to automate log rotation and monitor resource utilization, ensuring our EC2 instances stay within performance thresholds.
Amazon Linux helps tremendously in this scenario. The routine tasks we perform really stand out because of its tight integration with AWS services such as SSM and IAM, which makes managing permissions and remote access much smoother than on standard distributions such as Ubuntu. I have found that the kernel is specifically tuned for EC2, leading to faster boot times and better resource efficiency during automated deployments.
What is most valuable?
I would highlight the ease of automatic patching through the curated repositories, which ensures our instances stay compliant with minimal manual intervention.
The best features that Amazon Linux offers are, first, its Security-First design, which is a standout feature, as it comes with a minimal package set that significantly reduces our attack surface from the start. I also really value the version locking and predictable release cycles in AL2023, which gives us the stability we need for long-term production support.
The Security-First design helps us maintain confidence that our instances are not easily compromised because of its security-first approach. The minimal package set significantly reduces our maintenance overhead. During a recent vulnerability scan, we had nearly 40% fewer findings compared to our previous standard images. Regarding version locking, it was invaluable during a major scaling event where we needed to ensure every new instance was bit-for-bit identical, preventing a mid-rollout update from breaking our custom monitoring agents.
We have significantly improved our operational efficiencies by reducing the instance boot time. This directly impacts our organization's efficiency, making our auto-scaling much more responsive during traffic spikes. This streamlined our deployments and helped us maintain high availability with lower compute overhead.
What needs improvement?
Any technology can be improved. One minor frustration has been the lack of EPEL support, which forced us to manually compile a few niche packages that were previously easy to install. I would also like to see more streamlined documentation for migrating legacy scripts that rely on deprecated packages from older versions. Other than those transition hurdles, the performance gains have mostly outweighed the initial setup frictions.
I would like more comprehensive recipes in the documentation for hardening the operating system according to specific compliance standards such as CIS or FedRAMP. On the package side, a more centralized way to request or track the addition of popular community packages would bridge the gap left by the lack of EPEL.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Amazon Linux is quite stable. It is extremely stable and deeply integrated with the rest of the
AWS ecosystem, and its boot times are quite good.
Compared to other Linux distributions, Amazon Linux is significantly more stable for AWS workloads because it is pre-optimized for EC2 hypervisor and includes integrated AWS tools out of the box, compared to general-purpose distributions such as Ubuntu.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Amazon Linux is absolutely highly scalable. Since it is stable and efficient, we do not have any problems regarding scalability. Whenever there are traffic spikes, Amazon Linux handles it quite well.
How are customer service and support?
The customer support is excellent. We do not have any specific problems that we have had to reach out to customer support for. The support is good.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We previously were using other images of Linux distributions, such as Ubuntu. In our findings, we found that Amazon Linux images or instances boot up quite well and fast. That is why we decided to switch over to Amazon Linux.
How was the initial setup?
Regarding the setup, pricing, and licensing cost, I would say it is quite easy and streamlined to manage because we only have to select the Amazon Linux base image while deploying our machine or creating an EC2 instance. Clear pricing is mentioned for whatever duration we are using the machine, and the setup cost and licensing information are properly mentioned on the AWS page while we are initiating our EC2 instance. The experience is good with respect to this regard.
What about the implementation team?
We are a partner. We are not a reseller; we simply have a customer relationship with AWS, so we do not have any business relationship with the vendor beyond being a customer.
What was our ROI?
We have surely seen a return on investment. As mentioned, money saved is the number one metric that we have encountered. We have reduced our boot time and saved approximately $2,000 on a month-to-month basis.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Regarding the setup, pricing, and licensing cost, I would say it is quite easy and streamlined to manage because we only have to select the Amazon Linux base image while deploying our machine or creating an EC2 instance. Clear pricing is mentioned for whatever duration we are using the machine, and the setup cost and licensing information are properly mentioned on the AWS page while we are initiating our EC2 instance. The experience is good with respect to this regard.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We were considering using some other Windows images, but based on Amazon Linux documentation, we determined we should go with Amazon Linux compared to Windows distributions because we thought this would be much better, and that is why we selected it.
What other advice do I have?
Amazon Linux is quite customizable and highly flexible, especially when using cloud-init for automated, repeatable configuration during boot. For specialized workloads, I leverage Amazon Linux Extras library or specific repositories to pull in optimized runtimes such as
Docker or Python without bloating the base image.
The documentation and community support are top-notch. It is deeply integrated with the rest of the AWS ecosystem, making it easy to find specific configuration steps for services such as IAM or EC2.
It handles security and compliance requirements quite well, as the documentation is excellent. The security of Amazon Linux is also excellent, so we do not have to worry about that. The compliance for Amazon Linux is top-notch for our organization.
I would recommend using Amazon Linux without hesitation. In my experience, the customer support is quite reliable. Amazon Linux is quite stable, the documentation is great, and it is tightly integrated with the AWS service, so most of the support comes through the AWS support channel rather than a separate Linux support channel. I would recommend others who are going to use it feel confident using Amazon Linux without hesitation. The overall rating for this product is 9 out of 10.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Web services deployment has become flexible while security updates still need improvement
What is our primary use case?
My main use case for Amazon Linux is making the virtual machine and deploying the web application and different types of network services.
I am using the video analytics application for analytics for the ATCS and ITMS camera. I deploy all web applications on these Amazon Linux virtual machines and use it for microservices such as NGINX and Apache2.
Amazon Linux is used by my team for the testing environment and staging environment for the UAT and for the production environment. I can use different types of this Linux environment for my team.
What is most valuable?
The best features Amazon Linux offers are that it is a freeware RHEL and I can access it from anywhere in any location.
Amazon Linux has positively impacted my organization by providing the best security features and low space for the integration of web applications and microservices.
I can use the integrated firewall system as well as bind the port with different types of network, including different types of ports.
What needs improvement?
Amazon Linux can be improved by providing day-to-day patching updates.
The security features can be improved for another application such as NGINX and Apache2.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been working in my current field for approximately 8+ years.
I have been using Amazon Linux for more than five years.
What other advice do I have?
The advice I would give to others looking into using Amazon Linux is that it is highly scalable and provides different types of microservices, so I kindly recommend these services for a reliable cost. My review rating for Amazon Linux is 7 out of 10.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Hybrid Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Using a free, lightweight platform has enabled cost‑effective load generation at scale
What is our primary use case?
My main use case for Amazon Linux is that it serves as a replacement and a free version for a Red Hat-based OS for Amazon users. I use it in environments where a RHEL-based environment is required because a number of applications are pre-installed on Amazon Linux.
My main use case for Amazon Linux involves using these Linux machines as load generators. With Amazon Linux, you are not required to install a number of applications which are helpful for other applications. We have a CR controller and generators setup, where the generators are virtual machines on Amazon on an auto-scaling basis. For this, we use Amazon Linux as a base.
What is most valuable?
The best features Amazon Linux offers include that it is designed for Amazon users. The first one is that it is freeware. Red Hat has a subscription model. Another one is that a number of applications are pre-installed on Amazon Linux, which are helpful. It is easy to use Amazon services, and it integrates easily with Amazon services.
For example, the Amazon services I find it integrates best with are those requiring connection to Session Manager on any Ubuntu or RHEL machine, where you have to install it first, but on Amazon Linux, it is pre-installed.
In terms of features, it is freeware for Amazon. It is more similar to CentOS and OEL, Oracle Linux, but it is a lighter version for RHEL.
Amazon Linux has impacted my organization positively because in any organization, the first priority is cost. For Amazon Linux, it is not required to have any subscription, unlike a RHEL-based OS. If you are going for RHEL, it is a subscription model, and we have to purchase a subscription as per our requirements. We use it as a load generation tool, so we require a number of generators, sometimes more than 100. For 100 generators, the subscription costs too much. Amazon Linux is freeware, so it is very helpful for us.
What needs improvement?
I do not think Amazon Linux can be improved. It already has a lightweight freeware and is easily integrated with all the AWS services. I am not finding any room for improvement.
Specifically on Amazon Linux, I do not think there are any needed improvements.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Amazon Linux for around five plus years.
What other advice do I have?
I did not purchase Amazon Linux through the AWS Marketplace.
If anyone is using the AWS platform and they require a RHEL-based OS, they must use Amazon Linux. It easily integrates with any services in AWS, and it is pre-installed with a few required tools, so it is very helpful.
I have no additional thoughts about Amazon Linux before we wrap up.
I found this interview fine, and I do not think there is anything I should change for the future.
I give this product a review rating of 8.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Migration to secure, cost-optimized servers has improved monitoring and Kubernetes deployments
What is our primary use case?
My main use case for Amazon Linux is setting up Linux servers, monitoring servers, Kubernetes servers, testing, and setting up customer servers. I have used Amazon Linux for setting up customer monitoring solutions, such as Prometheus, Grafana, and ELK stack. I also used it for setting up a Kubernetes cluster.
What is most valuable?
Amazon Linux offers excellent support, which is better than other Linux distributions. The platform provides stable versions, quality packages, and reliable commands. The stability is a key attribute I appreciate about Amazon Linux.
What stands out to me is the regular updates, patches, and package support that Amazon Linux provides.
Amazon Linux has positively impacted my organization significantly. We were using Windows, but after switching to Amazon Linux, it is cost-optimized and very secure.
I do not measure cost optimization or security improvements in a formal way, but we compare our current Windows server costs with the projected costs if we switched to Amazon Linux. Windows is not very secure to use, whereas Amazon Linux is very secure.
What needs improvement?
Amazon Linux can be improved by providing more session time. When connecting using EC2 Connect, the session time is limited. If you are away from the window for more than five or ten minutes, you must restart your entire session. This is an area that could be enhanced.
Although Amazon Linux is stable, there is room for improvement.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Amazon Linux for more than four years through both my professional experience and learning experience.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
I rate Amazon Linux eight out of ten because it provides everything we need, but it still requires improvements in stability.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Amazon Linux has good scalability.
How are customer service and support?
Amazon Linux provides good customer support.
I rate the customer support for Amazon Linux as an eight out of ten.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I was using Windows servers before transitioning to Amazon Linux.
How was the initial setup?
I purchased Amazon Linux through the AWS Marketplace.
I had a good experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
I had a good experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We were confident we wanted to use Amazon Linux and did not evaluate other options.
What other advice do I have?
Amazon Linux is better than other Linux distributions such as Ubuntu and other standard Linux options. I recommend using Amazon Linux because it is managed by Amazon and has excellent support and stability. I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
