r7a.32xlarge

Analysis

The r7a.32xlarge is a memory optimized instance in the r7a series with 128 vCPUs and 1024 GiB of memory on AMD EPYC 9R14 (up to Up to 3.7 GHz), which makes it memory-heavy at 8 GiB of memory per vCPU.

Compared with the previous generation, it costs 34% more than the r6a.32xlarge on AMD EPYC 7R13 ($1,810 more a month per instance), in exchange for the newer processor.

Running it in N. Virginia instead of Frankfurt saves $1,467 a month per instance: $9.74/hour against $11.75/hour, a 21% spread. It is not offered in Canada Central, São Paulo, London, Mumbai, Singapore and Sydney, so plan around that if you need a presence there.

It is the cheapest of the 2 processor variants AWS sells at this size and generation. The r7iz.32xlarge on Intel Xeon Scalable (Sapphire Rapids) costs 22% more, and no others also sit above it.

On demand it costs $9.74/hour in US East (N. Virginia), $7,108 a month if left running, which puts it mid-table for memory optimized types at the 46th percentile per vCPU ($0.0761 per vCPU-hour) and the 62nd percentile per GiB ($0.00951 per GiB-hour).

Looking beyond its own line, 4 of 14 current types with 128 vCPUs and similar memory are cheaper. The cheapest of those is the r6i.32xlarge on Intel Xeon 8375C (Ice Lake) at $8.06/hour.