Amazon EKS – Node Types

Managed Node Groups

• EKS automatically provisions and manages EC2 worker nodes in an Auto Scaling Group.

• Nodes use Amazon EKS–optimized AMIs and integrate with cluster lifecycle operations.

• Supports both On-Demand and Spot Instances.

• Simplifies updates, scaling, and node replacement with minimal operational effort.

Self-Managed Nodes

• You manually create and manage EC2 instances, registering them to your EKS cluster.

• Typically managed via your own Auto Scaling Group.

• Supports Amazon EKS–optimized AMIs or custom AMIs.

• Works with On-Demand or Spot capacity.

• Offers full customization at the cost of increased operational complexity.

AWS Fargate

• Serverless compute option for Kubernetes pods—no EC2 instances to manage.

• AWS handles provisioning, scaling, and patching of the infrastructure.

• Ideal for smaller workloads, isolated services, or teams seeking minimal infrastructure management.