AWS Global Accelerator is a networking service that improves the availability and performance of your applications with users worldwide. By directing user traffic to the optimal endpoint based on health, geography, and routing policies, Global Accelerator ensures that applications are both performant and resilient.

Key Features of AWS Global Accelerator

1. Global Reach: Leverage the global AWS network to optimize routing and reduce latency for users around the world.
2. Static IP Addresses: Global Accelerator provides two static IP addresses that act as a fixed entry point for your applications, simplifying DNS management.
3. Health Checks: Continuously monitor the health of your application endpoints and route traffic only to healthy ones, ensuring high availability.
4. Traffic Management: Control how traffic is routed to your application endpoints, including Amazon EC2 instances, Elastic Load Balancers, and Amazon S3 buckets.
5. Multi Region Failover: Enhance the resilience of your applications by routing traffic to backup endpoints in different regions if the primary ones are unhealthy.

Benefits of AWS Global Accelerator

• Improved Performance: Reduce latency by routing traffic through the AWS global network, which optimizes the path taken by user requests.
• Enhanced Availability: Automatically reroute traffic to healthy endpoints, ensuring high availability and minimal downtime.
• Simplified DNS Management: Use static IP addresses to avoid frequent DNS changes, making it easier to manage your application.
• Global Load Balancing: Balance user traffic across multiple regions, improving the overall user experience.

Use Cases for AWS Global Accelerator

1. Gaming Applications: Reduce latency for players around the globe by directing them to the nearest game server.
2. Media Streaming: Ensure high availability and low latency for streaming applications by routing users to healthy endpoints.
3. Web Applications: Improve the performance and reliability of web applications by utilizing AWS Global Accelerator to manage traffic.
4. APIs and Microservices: Optimize the performance of APIs and microservices by directing traffic to the best-performing endpoints.

Prerequisites for Setting Up AWS Global Accelerator

Before setting up AWS Global Accelerator, ensure you have the following:

1. AWS Account: You must have an active AWS account to access the AWS Management Console.
2. Application Endpoints: Identify the endpoints (such as EC2 instances, ALBs, NLBs, or IP addresses) that you want to accelerate.
3. IAM Permissions: Ensure your IAM user has the necessary permissions to create and manage Global Accelerators.

Step by Step Guide to Setting Up AWS Global Accelerator

 Access the AWS Management Console

1. Sign in using your AWS credentials.
2. In the Services menu, navigate to Global Accelerator under the Networking & Content Delivery category.

Create a Global Accelerator

1. In the Global Accelerator dashboard, click on the Create accelerator button.

2. In the Create Accelerator dialog, configure the following settings:

   • Name: Provide a name for your Global Accelerator.
   • IP Address Type: Choose whether to use IPv4 or dual-stack (IPv4 and IPv6).
   • Client Affinity: Optionally, enable client affinity if you want clients to always be routed to the same endpoint.

3. Click on Create accelerator.

Configure Endpoint Groups

After creating the accelerator, you need to set up endpoint groups for your application.

1. On the accelerator details page, under the Endpoint groups section, click on Add endpoint group.

2. In the Add endpoint group dialog, configure the following:

   • Region: Select the AWS region where your endpoints are located.
   • Traffic Dial: Set the percentage of traffic that should be directed to this endpoint group (0-100%).
   • Health Check Settings: Configure health checks to monitor the status of your endpoints. You can define:
     • Protocol: Choose the protocol (HTTP, HTTPS, TCP) for health checks.
     • Path: Specify the path for HTTP/HTTPS health checks (e.g., /health).
     • Healthy Threshold: Set the number of successful health checks required to mark an endpoint as healthy.
     • Unhealthy Threshold: Set the number of failed health checks required to mark an endpoint as unhealthy.
     • Health Check Interval: Specify the frequency of health checks (in seconds).

3. Click on Add endpoint group.

Add Endpoints

Once the endpoint group is created, you can add endpoints.

1. On the endpoint group details page, click on Add endpoints.

2. In the Add endpoints dialog, configure the following:

   • Endpoint type: Choose the type of endpoint (e.g., EC2 instance, Network Load Balancer, Application Load Balancer).
   • Endpoint: Select the specific endpoint you want to add.
   • Weight: Assign a weight to the endpoint to control traffic distribution.

3. Click on Add endpoints to complete the process.

Review and Update

Review your configurations and make any necessary adjustments. Ensure that the endpoints you’ve added are healthy and properly configured.

DNS Configuration

After setting up your Global Accelerator, AWS provides two static IP addresses for your accelerator.

1. Navigate to the Global Accelerator dashboard.
2. Copy the static IP addresses provided for your accelerator.
3. Update your DNS records (e.g., Route 53) to point to these static IP addresses, ensuring that users can access your application through the Global Accelerator.

Testing the Global Accelerator

To ensure that the Global Accelerator is functioning correctly:

1. Access your application using the static IP addresses provided by Global Accelerator.
2. Monitor the traffic through AWS CloudWatch to see how requests are being routed and check the health of your endpoints.
3. Test failover scenarios by simulating endpoint failures to verify that traffic is correctly routed to healthy endpoints.

Monitoring and Managing AWS Global Accelerator

Monitoring Your Accelerator

AWS provides monitoring tools to track the performance and health of your Global Accelerator:

• CloudWatch Metrics: Monitor metrics such as bytes in/out, request count, and health check status for your endpoints.
• AWS CloudTrail: Use CloudTrail to track changes made to your Global Accelerator and associated resources.

Updating Your Configuration

You may need to update your Global Accelerator configurations as your application evolves. This includes:

• Adding or Removing Endpoints: Modify the endpoint groups to include new application instances or remove those that are no longer needed.
• Adjusting Traffic Dial Settings: Fine-tune the traffic distribution between endpoint groups based on performance metrics or application needs.

Deleting an Accelerator

If you no longer need a Global Accelerator, you can delete it:

1. In the Global Accelerator dashboard, select the accelerator you want to delete.
2. Click on Delete and confirm the deletion.

Best Practices for AWS Global Accelerator

1. Use Static IPs: Take advantage of the static IP addresses provided by Global Accelerator for easier DNS management.
2. Optimize Health Checks: Regularly review and optimize health check configurations to ensure timely detection of unhealthy endpoints.
3. Leverage Traffic Dials: Use traffic dials to control traffic distribution and balance loads effectively across multiple regions.
4. Monitor Performance: Continuously monitor the performance of your accelerator using CloudWatch metrics to identify potential issues and make necessary adjustments.
5. Document Changes: Keep detailed documentation of your Global Accelerator configurations and any changes made to assist with troubleshooting and management.

Limitations of AWS Global Accelerator

While AWS Global Accelerator provides many advantages, it also has certain limitations:

1. Endpoint Limitations: There is a maximum limit on the number of endpoints you can add to an endpoint group (currently 50).
2. Protocol Support: Global Accelerator supports only certain protocols (TCP and UDP) for health checks.
3. Static IP Allocation: Each Global Accelerator provides only two static IP addresses, which may limit some use cases.
4. Additional Costs: Using Global Accelerator incurs additional costs, including data transfer fees, which should be considered when budgeting.

AWS Global Accelerator is a robust solution for enhancing the performance and availability of applications globally. By following best practices and leveraging the features offered by Global Accelerator, organizations can optimize user experiences and ensure high availability for their applications. Whether you are running gaming applications, media streaming services, or web applications, AWS Global Accelerator provides the tools necessary to improve latency and enhance the overall performance of your applications.