Elastic GPU Service (EGS) instance names encode the product, instance family, and vCPU count directly into the name. Once you understand the pattern, you can read any instance name and immediately know its GPU type, hardware architecture, and size—without consulting a spec sheet.
This topic covers naming conventions for heterogeneous computing instance families, ECS Bare Metal instance families, and Super Computing Cluster (SCC) instance families. Other instance families follow separate conventions not described here.
Name structure
Every instance type name follows this format:
ecs.<instance-family>.<nx>large| Segment | Description | Example |
|---|---|---|
ecs | Product code for Elastic Compute Service (ECS) | ecs |
<instance-family> | Family name body + family name suffix | gn6v, ebmgn7e |
<nx>large | vCPU count — higher n means more vCPUs | 24xlarge = 96 vCPUs |
vCPU count reference:
| Suffix | vCPUs |
|---|---|
xlarge | 4 |
2xlarge | 8 |
3xlarge | 12 |
For larger sizes, multiply n by 4. For example, 24xlarge = 24 x 4 = 96 vCPUs.
Instance family names
An instance family name consists of two parts: a name body and a name suffix. Together they identify the GPU type, hardware architecture generation, and product line.
Name body
The name body identifies the acceleration type and product line.
| Name body | Instance type |
|---|---|
gn | NVIDIA GPU-accelerated compute-optimized |
vgn | NVIDIA GRID vGPU-accelerated dedicated |
sgn | NVIDIA GRID vGPU-accelerated shared |
gi | Intel GPU-accelerated compute-optimized |
f | FPGA-accelerated compute-optimized |
ebmc, ebmg, ebmr, ebmgn, ebmhf | ECS Bare Metal instance |
sccc, sccg, scch, sccgn, scchf | Super Computing Cluster (SCC) |
Name suffix
The name suffix identifies the hardware architecture generation (number) and GPU model or feature (letter).
Generation numbers:
| Number | Architecture |
|---|---|
6 | Volta or Turing |
7 | Ampere |
Feature letters:
| Letter | Meaning |
|---|---|
v | NVIDIA V100 GPUs with 16 GB of GPU memory each |
e | Generation 6 (6e): second-generation NVIDIA V100 GPUs with 32 GB of GPU memory each (short for "extend"). Generation 7 (7e): Ampere architecture (see Example 2 for details). |
i | NVIDIA T4 GPUs (generation 6) or NVIDIA A10 GPUs with 24 GB of GPU memory each (generation 7, short for "inference") |
s | Sixth-generation SG-1 (generation 6) or seventh-generation NVIDIA A30 GPUs (generation 7) |
For example, the suffix 6v means Volta or Turing architecture with NVIDIA V100 GPUs (16 GB). The suffix 7i means Ampere architecture with NVIDIA A10 GPUs optimized for inference.
Decode an instance name
The following examples show how to read each segment of an instance name.
Example 1: `ecs.sccgn6.24xlarge`
| Segment | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Product | ecs | Elastic Compute Service |
| Family body | sccgn | GPU-accelerated compute-optimized SCC instance |
| Family suffix | 6 | Volta or Turing architecture |
| Size | 24xlarge | 24 x 4 = 96 vCPUs |
Example 2: `ecs.ebmgn7e.32xlarge`
| Segment | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Product | ecs | Elastic Compute Service |
| Family body | ebmgn | GPU-accelerated compute-optimized ECS Bare Metal instance |
| Family suffix | 7e | Ampere architecture; |
| Size | 32xlarge | 32 x 4 = 128 vCPUs |
Example 3: `ecs.vgn6i-m4.xlarge`
| Segment | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Product | ecs | Elastic Compute Service |
| Family body | vgn | NVIDIA GRID vGPU-accelerated dedicated instance |
| Family suffix | 6i | Volta or Turing architecture; NVIDIA T4 GPU |
| Driver | — | Uses the NVIDIA GRID driver |
| Size | xlarge | 4 vCPUs |