Is it possible to turn off an EC2 instance without losing installed programs and data?

Question

I launched an EC2 Windows Server via AWS and connected to it via remote desktop. I installed Anaconda and a trading platform (TWS). I would like to only pay for the instance while I'm using it, and there are many days when I don't need it, but I am being billed hourly. Is there a way to pause it/use it on an as-needed basis without wiping the installed programs and data?

Thanks.

Answer 1

There are two types of disk volumes on EC2. The default, most common type is EBS, which will save the contents of the disk volume while the instance is in the stopped state.

The other disk volume type is instance store volumes, which are ephemeral, meaning they are cleared each time you stop the instance. Only certain EC2 instance types will have instance storage.

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You can also add AWS EFS volumes to EC2 instances, which is network file storage that can be shared by multiple EC2 instances, and exist independently of your EC2 instances.