What is AWS Global Accelerator?

AWS Global Accelerator is a networking service provided by Amazon Web Services (AWS) that improves the availability and performance of your internet applications by directing user traffic to optimal endpoints across AWS global network infrastructure. Here are some key features of AWS Global Accelerator:

  1. Global Anycast IP Addresses:
    • Global Accelerator provides static IP addresses that serve as entry points to your applications hosted in multiple AWS Regions and AWS services. These IP addresses are anycasted from edge locations around the world, ensuring low-latency access to your applications from anywhere.
  2. Traffic Distribution:
    • Global Accelerator continuously monitors the health and performance of your endpoints, such as Application Load Balancers (ALBs), Network Load Balancers (NLBs), EC2 instances, or Elastic IP addresses (EIPs), in multiple AWS Regions.
    • It uses intelligent routing algorithms to dynamically route user traffic to the nearest and most responsive endpoint based on network conditions, latency, and health checks.
  3. Anycast Routing:
    • Anycast routing enables Global Accelerator to route user traffic to the nearest edge location, minimizing the number of network hops and reducing latency for end users. This ensures a consistent and reliable user experience across different geographic regions.
  4. Health Checks and Failover:
    • Global Accelerator performs health checks on your endpoints to monitor their availability and performance. If an endpoint becomes unhealthy or unresponsive, Global Accelerator automatically reroutes traffic to healthy endpoints to maintain application availability.
  5. Elastic IP Address Preservation:
    • With Global Accelerator, you can associate Elastic IP addresses (EIPs) with your accelerator, allowing you to preserve your existing IP addresses and easily migrate your applications to Global Accelerator without changing IP addresses.
  6. Integration with AWS Services:
    • Global Accelerator integrates seamlessly with other AWS services, such as Amazon EC2, Elastic Load Balancing (ELB), AWS Global Accelerator, and AWS Shield. You can use Global Accelerator to improve the performance and availability of your applications hosted on AWS infrastructure.
  7. Real-Time Metrics and Monitoring:
    • Global Accelerator provides real-time metrics and monitoring through Amazon CloudWatch, allowing you to monitor the performance and health of your accelerators and endpoints, track traffic patterns, and troubleshoot issues.

Overall, AWS Global Accelerator is a powerful networking service that helps you optimize the delivery of your internet applications by directing user traffic to the closest and most responsive endpoints, improving availability, performance, and reliability for your users worldwide.