r6in.12xlarge

Analysis

The r6in.12xlarge is a memory optimized instance in the r6in series with 48 vCPUs and 384 GiB of memory on Intel Xeon 8375C (Ice Lake) (up to 3.5 GHz), which makes it memory-heavy at 8 GiB of memory per vCPU.

Within the same generation and size, the r6g.12xlarge on AWS Graviton2 costs $2.42/hour, 42% less ($1,288 a month), though switching means rebuilding software for arm64. The other variants are the r6a.12xlarge at $2.72, the r6gd.12xlarge at $2.76 and the r6i.12xlarge at $3.02.

Running it in N. Virginia instead of Sydney saves $656 a month per instance: $4.18/hour against $5.08/hour, a 21% spread. It is not offered in São Paulo, London and Mumbai, so plan around that if you need a presence there.

On demand it costs $4.18/hour in US East (N. Virginia), $3,054 a month if left running, which puts it mid-table for memory optimized types at the 60th percentile per vCPU ($0.0872 per vCPU-hour) and the 75th percentile per GiB ($0.0109 per GiB-hour).

Looking beyond its own line, 26 of 40 current types with 48 vCPUs and similar memory are cheaper. The cheapest of those is the r7g.12xlarge on AWS Graviton3 at $2.57/hour.

It is size 6 of 9 in the r6in series. Stepping up to the r6in.16xlarge gives 64 vCPUs and 512 GiB for $1,018 more a month. Dropping to the r6in.8xlarge saves $1,018 a month.