AWS
The cloud infrastructure that most of the internet runs on.
What it is
Amazon Web Services is Amazon's cloud computing platform - the infrastructure layer that runs a significant percentage of the internet. Netflix, Airbnb, NASA, the BBC, and thousands of other organisations run on AWS. It provides virtual servers, managed databases, file storage, content delivery networks, email services, authentication, and hundreds of other managed infrastructure components, all accessible via API without owning any physical hardware.
The key proposition is managed infrastructure: instead of buying servers, maintaining them, handling hardware failures, and scaling manually, you provision the capacity you need from AWS and pay for what you use. AWS handles the physical hardware, redundancy, and global distribution.
How I use it
AWS comes into play on projects requiring custom backend infrastructure, file storage (S3 for user uploads, assets, and backups), serverless functions (Lambda for event-driven processing), or managed databases (RDS for PostgreSQL). For static sites and Next.js applications, Vercel usually handles deployment; AWS is used when the project needs more infrastructure control.
CloudFront (AWS's CDN) is also used for serving static assets close to users globally, reducing load times regardless of where visitors are geographically.
Why this over the alternatives
AWS, Google Cloud, and Azure are all capable cloud providers. AWS has the broadest service catalogue and the largest market share, which means more documentation, more integrations, and a larger pool of knowledge to draw from. For serverless and infrastructure work, it's the most mature option.
What it means for your site
- Global infrastructure with data centres on every continent for low-latency delivery
- Pay-per-use pricing - no fixed cost for infrastructure that isn't being used
- Managed services handle backups, updates, and redundancy automatically
- Scales to any traffic level without manual intervention
