For more information, see Work with Spot Instance in the Amazon EC2 User Guide.
We strongly discourage using the RequestSpotInstances API because it is a legacy API with no planned investment. For options for requesting Spot Instances, see Which is the best Spot request method to use? in the Amazon EC2 User Guide.
The following parameters are for this specific action. For more information about required and optional parameters that are common to all actions, see Common Query Parameters.
AvailabilityZoneGroupThe user-specified name for a logical grouping of requests.
When you specify an Availability Zone group in a Spot Instance request, all Spot Instances in the request are launched in the same Availability Zone. Instance proximity is maintained with this parameter, but the choice of Availability Zone is not. The group applies only to requests for Spot Instances of the same instance type. Any additional Spot Instance requests that are specified with the same Availability Zone group name are launched in that same Availability Zone, as long as at least one instance from the group is still active.
If there is no active instance running in the Availability Zone group that you specify for a new Spot Instance request (all instances are terminated, the request is expired, or the maximum price you specified falls below current Spot price), then Amazon EC2 launches the instance in any Availability Zone where the constraint can be met. Consequently, the subsequent set of Spot Instances could be placed in a different zone from the original request, even if you specified the same Availability Zone group.
Default: Instances are launched in any available Availability Zone.
BlockDurationMinutes
ClientToken
Unique, case-sensitive identifier that you provide to ensure the idempotency of the request. For more information, see Ensuring idempotency in Amazon EC2 API requests in the Amazon EC2 User Guide.
Checks whether you have the required permissions for the action, without actually making the request, and provides an error response. If you have the required permissions, the error response is DryRunOperation . Otherwise, it is UnauthorizedOperation .
InstanceCount
The maximum number of Spot Instances to launch.
InstanceInterruptionBehavior
The behavior when a Spot Instance is interrupted. The default is terminate .
Valid Values: hibernate | stop | terminate
LaunchGroup
The instance launch group. Launch groups are Spot Instances that launch together and terminate together.
Default: Instances are launched and terminated individually
LaunchSpecification
The launch specification.
The maximum price per unit hour that you are willing to pay for a Spot Instance. We do not recommend using this parameter because it can lead to increased interruptions. If you do not specify this parameter, you will pay the current Spot price.
If you specify a maximum price, your instances will be interrupted more frequently than if you do not specify this parameter.
TagSpecification.N
The key-value pair for tagging the Spot Instance request on creation. The value for ResourceType must be spot-instances-request , otherwise the Spot Instance request fails. To tag the Spot Instance request after it has been created, see CreateTags.
Type: Array of TagSpecification objects
The Spot Instance request type.
Valid Values: one-time | persistent
The start date of the request. If this is a one-time request, the request becomes active at this date and time and remains active until all instances launch, the request expires, or the request is canceled. If the request is persistent, the request becomes active at this date and time and remains active until it expires or is canceled.
The specified start date and time cannot be equal to the current date and time. You must specify a start date and time that occurs after the current date and time.
The following elements are returned by the service.
requestIdThe ID of the request.
spotInstanceRequestSet
The Spot Instance requests.
For information about the errors that are common to all actions, see Common client error codes.
This example creates a one-time Spot Instance request for two instances. It does not include an Availability Zone or subnet, so Amazon EC2 selects an Availability Zone for you and launches the instances in the default subnet of the selected Availability Zone.
https://ec2.amazonaws.com/?Action=RequestSpotInstances &InstanceCount=2 &Type=one-time &LaunchSpecification.ImageId=ami-1a2b3c4d &LaunchSpecification.KeyName=my-key-pair &LaunchSpecification.SecurityGroupId.1=sg-1a2b3c4d &LaunchSpecification.InstanceType=m3.medium &LaunchSpecification.IamInstanceProfile.Name=s3access &AUTHPARAMSThe following example includes an Availability Zone. Amazon EC2 launches the instances in the default subnet of the specified Availability Zone.
https://ec2.amazonaws.com/?Action=RequestSpotInstances &InstanceCount=2 &Type=one-time &LaunchSpecification.ImageId=ami-1a2b3c4d &LaunchSpecification.KeyName=my-key-pair &LaunchSpecification.SecurityGroupId.1=sg-1a2b3c4d &LaunchSpecification.InstanceType=m3.medium &LaunchSpecification.Placement.AvailabilityZone=us-west-2a &LaunchSpecification.IamInstanceProfile.Name=s3access &AUTHPARAMSThe following example includes a subnet. Amazon EC2 launches the instances in the specified subnet.
https://ec2.amazonaws.com/?Action=RequestSpotInstances &InstanceCount=2 &Type=one-time &LaunchSpecification.ImageId=ami-1a2b3c4d &LaunchSpecification.KeyName=my-key-pair &LaunchSpecification.SecurityGroupId.1=sg-1a2b3c4d &LaunchSpecification.InstanceType=m3.medium &LaunchSpecification.SubnetId=subnet-1a2b3c4d &LaunchSpecification.IamInstanceProfile.Name=s3access &AUTHPARAMSFor more information about using this API in one of the language-specific Amazon SDKs, see the following: