m6in.32xlarge

Analysis

The m6in.32xlarge is a general purpose instance in the m6in series with 128 vCPUs and 512 GiB of memory on Intel Xeon 8375C (Ice Lake) (up to 3.5 GHz), which makes it balanced at 4 GiB of memory per vCPU.

Within the same generation and size, the m6a.32xlarge on AMD EPYC 7R13 costs $5.53/hour, 38% less ($2,468 a month). The other variants are the m6i.32xlarge at $6.14, the m6id.32xlarge at $7.59 and the m6idn.32xlarge at $10.18.

Running it in N. Virginia instead of São Paulo saves $3,862 a month per instance: $8.91/hour against $14.20/hour, a 59% spread.

On demand it costs $8.91/hour in US East (N. Virginia), $6,505 a month if left running, which puts it mid-table for general purpose types at the 73rd percentile per vCPU ($0.0696 per vCPU-hour) and the 73rd percentile per GiB ($0.0174 per GiB-hour).

Looking beyond its own line, 6 of 12 current types with 128 vCPUs and similar memory are cheaper. The cheapest of those is the m8i.32xlarge on Intel Xeon Scalable (Granite Rapids) at $6.77/hour.

Reserving it for a year with no upfront payment cuts the Linux rate to $5.61/hour, which beats on demand once it runs more than 63% of the time; three years brings it to $3.43/hour, 61% below on demand. Windows Server roughly adds 66% to the bill at $14.80/hour, because the licence is charged per vCPU.