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Elastic Compute Service:Release notes

Last Updated:Apr 29, 2026

This topic lists release notes and documentation updates for ECS features.

2026

March 2026

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

Related documents

Snapshot consistency group

The limits for a single snapshot consistency group have increased. A single group can now contain up to 128 cloud disks with a total capacity of up to 256 TiB.

2026-03-30

All regions

Create a snapshot consistency group

Snapshot lock

You can now lock snapshots to prevent deletion. No user can delete a locked snapshot until it is unlocked or the lock period expires.

2026-03-18

All regions

Lock a snapshot

Snapshot consistency group

Snapshot consistency groups now support concurrent operations.

2026-03-16

All regions

Create a snapshot consistency group

February 2026

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

Related documents

Cloud disk attachment

For a cloud disk that is in the Available state, you can now view the instance it was last attached to.

2026-02-04

All regions

View a cloud disk's last attached instance

Automatic snapshot policy

You can now bind multiple automatic snapshot policies to a single cloud disk.

2026-02-02

All regions

Set an automatic snapshot policy for a cloud disk

January 2026

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

Related documents

Snapshot quota

A single cloud disk can now retain up to 2,000 manual and automatic snapshots.

2026-01-26

All regions

Snapshot limits

Replication time control (RTC)

Asynchronous cloud disk replication now supports the replication time control (RTC) feature.

2026-01-15

All regions

Replication time control (RTC)

2025

November 2025

Feature

Overview

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Snapshot archiving

You can now archive multiple snapshots at once.

2025-11

All regions

Archive Snapshots

August 2025

Feature

Overview

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Instance family

The g9a general-purpose instance family is now available.

2025-08-30

Select regions

g9a general-purpose instance family

Instance family

The g9ae general-purpose instance family is now available.

2025-08-30

Select regions

g9ae general-purpose instance family

July 2025

Feature

Overview

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Snapshot creation

You can now create multiple snapshots at once.

2025-07

All regions

Create a snapshot

May 2025

Feature

Overview

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Global Search

Global Search offers a centralized way to manage resources, letting you query resources, invoke operations, access console menus, and find documentation.

2025-05-13

All regions

ECS Global Search

April 2025

Feature

Overview

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Instance family

The g9i general-purpose instance family is now available.

2025-04-09

Select regions

g9i general-purpose instance family

Instance family

The c9i compute-optimized instance family is now available.

2025-04-09

Select regions

Compute-optimized instance family c9i

Instance family

The r9i memory-optimized instance family is now available.

2025-04-09

Select regions

Memory-optimized instance family r9i

March 2025

Feature

Overview

Release date

Region

Related documentation

RHEL 8 to RHEL 9 upgrade

You can now upgrade your RHEL 8 instances to RHEL 9 for the latest features, hardware compatibility, and long-term support. This upgrade is available even during the RHEL 8 Full Support phase.

2025-03-13

All regions

Red Hat Enterprise Linux upgrade

2024

December 2024

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Instance family

The sgn8ia GPU-virtualized instance family is now available.

2024-12-27

Select regions

Instance family

November 2024

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Instance family

The gn8v GPU-compute instance family is now available.

2024-11-20

Select regions

GPU-compute instance family gn8v/gn8v-tee

Instance family

The ebmgn8v GPU-compute Elastic Bare Metal Server instance family is now available.

2024-11-20

Select regions

GPU-compute Elastic Bare Metal Server instance family ebmgn8v

October 2024

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Snapshot type

The normal snapshot type has been renamed to standard snapshot.

2024-10-21

All regions

Change operating system

Changing an operating system now includes pre-checks.

2024-10-18

All regions

Change the operating system (replace the system disk)

September 2024

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Instance family

The gn8is GPU-compute instance family is now available.

2024-09-13

Select regions

Instance family

Instance family

The ebmgn8is GPU-compute Elastic Bare Metal Server instance family is now available.

2024-09-12

Select regions

GPU-compute Elastic Bare Metal Server instance family ebmgn8is

Operating system migration and upgrade

The operating system migration and upgrade process now includes migration checks.

2024-09-11

All regions

Operating system migration

August 2024

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

ESSD AutoPL cloud disk

ESSD AutoPL cloud disks now support a cost-capping feature for performance bursts.

2024-08-22

All regions

ESSD AutoPL cloud disk

July 2024

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Regional ESSDs

A zone-redundant ESSD is a new ESSD cloud disk type. Data is automatically stored across multiple availability zones, which are physically isolated with separate data centers, racks, and power supplies.

2024-07-25

All regions

Regional ESSDs

Application Management

The Application Management feature in CloudLens for EBS generates reports from cloud disk monitoring data and periodically sends you notifications by email or internal message. These reports provide a comprehensive analysis of your resources—including quantity, capacity, and distribution by region and type—to help you optimize resource planning and cost management.

2024-07-17

All regions

Application Management

Install Vminit

You can now install Vminit when you create a Windows custom image. Vminit handles initialization for ECS instances, including network configuration, hostname setup, and custom script execution.

2024-07-03

All regions

Install Vminit

Install virtio driver

You can now install the virtio driver from an installation package when you create a Windows custom image.

2024-07-03

All regions

Install virtio driver

Risk event overview

When CloudLens for EBS detects potential risks, such as a cloud disk reaching its performance limit or a lack of recent snapshot backups, it reports a risk event. These alerts enable you to act quickly to ensure the stability of your cloud disks and the security of your data.

2024-07-03

All regions

Cloud disk event overview

June 2024

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Prevent RAM users from creating high-risk security group rules

Use RAM condition keys in custom permission policies for RAM users to enhance your Alibaba Cloud account security. These policies restrict permissions for creating security groups or adding security group rules. For example, you can prohibit rules that include specific IP addresses and protocols, limit the scope of new rules, or prevent the use of the default security group when creating ECS instances.

2024-06-25

All regions

Prevent RAM users from creating high-risk security group rules

Operating system EOL solutions

After an operating system reaches its End of Life (EOL), Alibaba Cloud no longer provides software updates or security patches. Alibaba Cloud offers comprehensive EOL solutions for EOL versions of CentOS, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Windows Server, and Alibaba Cloud Linux.

2024-06-18

All regions

Operating system maintenance lifecycle and EOL solutions

Upgrade a Savings Plan

When your ECS usage grows significantly beyond your Savings Plan's committed spend, the plan may no longer be cost-effective. You can upgrade your Savings Plan by increasing its committed spend for greater discounts.

2024-06-06

All regions

Upgrade a Savings Plan

Renew or automatically renew a Savings Plan

Before your Savings Plan expires, you can renew it or enable auto-renewal to extend its term.

2024-06-06

All regions

Renew or automatically renew a Savings Plan

May 2024

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Vminit component

The Vminit component automatically runs configuration tasks on instance startup to initialize the system or perform other configurations.

2024-05-23

All regions

Introduction to initialization tools

April 2024

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

ECS instance boot mode

ECS instances and images now support the UEFI-Preferred dual boot mode, which supports both UEFI and Legacy BIOS.

2024-04-11

All regions

Instance boot mode

March 2024

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Shared private pool

You can use Resource Directory to share a private pool with other Alibaba Cloud accounts or members of your organization. Other accounts can then use the shared private pool to create ECS instances. This improves resource utilization and reduces costs.

2024-03-28

All regions

Share a private pool

February 2024

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Build a TDX confidential computing environment

Intel® Trust Domain Extensions (TDX) is a hardware-based security technology for ECS instances. In a TDX instance, the CPU hardware confidentially protects registers, memory data, and interrupt handling. Neither the cloud provider nor external attackers can monitor or tamper with the internal state of the instance, such as its running processes or sensitive data being processed.

2024-02-08

China (Beijing) Zone I

Build a TDX confidential computing environment

Modify Cloud Assistant task execution information

If a Cloud Assistant task no longer meets your business needs, you can modify it by changing the command content, adjusting the schedule, or updating the target ECS or managed instances.

2024-02-02

All regions

Modify task execution information

January 2024

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Cloud Assistant supports task status and heartbeat events

Cloud Assistant events include task status events and heartbeat events. You can subscribe to these events to receive task execution statuses and heartbeat reports, helping you optimize cloud resource management and monitoring.

2024-01-19

All regions

Subscribe to Cloud Assistant events

2023

December 2023

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Operating system upgrade

  • You can perform same-language upgrades from Windows Server 2008 to Windows Server 2012.

  • You can perform same-language upgrades from Windows Server 2012 to Windows Server 2016.

2023-12-28

All regions

Migrate operating systems

Monitor and diagnose eRDMA

You can monitor eRDMA with Cloud Monitor and the diagnostic tool.

2023-12-21

All regions

Monitor and diagnose eRDMA

November 2023

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Burstable bandwidth

Select sixth-generation and later instance types now support burstable bandwidth, which provides higher network performance during sudden traffic spikes.

2023-11-06

All regions

Network bandwidth

October 2023

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Cloud disks

ESSD AutoPL and ESSD PL0 cloud disks support a minimum capacity of 1 GB in the China (Hohhot), China (Guangzhou), and Korea (Seoul) regions.

2023-10-30

Select regions

Cloud disk overview

Instant snapshot availability

As part of a phased rollout, the instant snapshot availability feature was upgraded. New snapshots for ESSD PL0/1/2/3 and ESSD AutoPL cloud disks are now instantly available by default and require no additional configuration.

2023-10-12

All regions

Instant snapshot availability

Extended snapshot retention

You can extend the retention period of existing manual and automatic snapshots to meet data backup or compliance requirements.

2023-10-09

All regions

September 2023

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Migrate operating systems

You can now migrate instances from Alibaba Cloud Linux 2 to Alibaba Cloud Linux 3.

2023-09-20

All regions

Migrate operating systems

Share encrypted snapshots

You can now share encrypted snapshots.

2023-09-01

All regions

Share snapshots

August 2023

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Workbench

Workbench now uses the AliyunServiceRoleForECSWorkbench service-linked role to access ECS and Elastic Container Instance (ECI).

2023-08-28

All regions

The service-linked role for Workbench

May 2023

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Copy encrypted snapshots

You can copy encrypted snapshots within the same region or across regions to back up data or change the encryption status of a snapshot.

2023-05-25

All regions

Copy a snapshot

Share snapshots

You can share system disk or data disk snapshots with other Alibaba Cloud accounts or members of your enterprise by using Resource Directory. This allows recipients to create cloud disks from your shared snapshots for O&M purposes.

2023-05-25

All regions

Share snapshots

April 2023

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Instance family

Introduced g8a, a general-purpose instance family.

2023-04-21

Select regions

g8a general-purpose instance family

Instance family

Introduced c8a, a compute-optimized instance family.

2023-04-21

Select regions

Compute-optimized instance family c8a

Instance family

Introduced r8a, a memory-optimized instance family.

2023-04-21

Select regions

Instance family

Modify the boot mode of an image

You can now change an image's boot mode (UEFI or BIOS) in the ECS console. This mode determines how the system disk boots when an ECS instance is created from the image.

2023-04-09

All regions

Modify the properties and tags of an image

March 2023

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Manage network MTU

You can enable or disable jumbo frames for ECS instances.

2023-03-25

All regions

Jumbo frames

Instance family

Introduced g8i, a general-purpose instance family.

2023-03-21

Select regions

g8i general-purpose instance family

Instance family

Introduced c8i, a compute-optimized instance family.

2023-03-21

Select regions

Compute-optimized instance family c8i

Instance family

Introduced r8i, a memory-optimized instance family.

2023-03-21

Select regions

Instance family

Instance family

Introduced g8ae, a general-purpose balanced enhanced instance family.

2023-03-15

Select regions

g8ae performance-enhanced general-purpose instance family

Instance family

Introduced c8ae, a compute-optimized balanced enhanced instance family.

2023-03-15

Select regions

Enhanced compute-balanced instance family c8ae

Instance family

Introduced r8ae, a memory-optimized balanced enhanced instance family.

2023-03-15

Select regions

Instance family

February 2023

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Cloud disk resizing

On supported operating systems, you can now use Cloud Assistant to resize cloud disk partitions and file systems directly from the ECS console.

2023-02-22

All regions

Step 1: Resize a cloud disk

Migrate operating systems

You can now migrate instances from CentOS 7 to Alibaba Cloud Linux 3.

2023-02-14

All regions

Migrate operating systems

Migrate operating systems

You can now perform same-version or cross-version migrations for instances running CentOS 7 and CentOS 8.

2023-02-02

All regions

Migrate operating systems

2022

November 2022

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Instance family

The g6r general-purpose instance family is now available.

2022-11-17

Select regions

General-purpose instance family g6r

Instance family

The c8y compute-optimized instance family is now available.

2022-11-15

Select regions

Compute-optimized instance family c8y

Instance family

The r8y memory-optimized instance family is now available.

2022-11-15

Select regions

Memory-optimized instance family r8y

September 2022

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

ESSD AutoPL disk

ESSD AutoPL disks, a new disk type based on ESSD, decouple capacity from performance while retaining the core features and performance of ESSD cloud disks.

2022-09-28

Select regions

ESSD AutoPL disks

Change instance types across availability zones

You can change an ECS instance's type while migrating it across availability zones, allowing for simultaneous resizing and migration.

2022-09-22

All regions

Change instance types across availability zones

August 2022

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Anti-DDoS Origin Basic

The protection threshold policy for public IP addresses on ECS instances has been adjusted.

2022-08-31

All regions

Anti-DDoS Origin Basic

Instance family

The gn7e GPU compute-optimized instance family is now available.

2022-08-25

Select regions

Instance family

Basic operations in Workbench

Workbench now supports file management and multi-screen terminal features.

2022-08-09

All regions

July 2022

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Modify elastic network interfaces

You can modify the properties of a primary network interface.

2022-07-28

All regions

Modify the properties of an elastic network interface

Instance family

Selected instance types in the general-purpose, compute-optimized, memory-optimized, high-clock-speed, and supercomputing cluster families now support more IPv6 addresses per network interface.

2022-07-28

All regions

Instance type families

Basic operations in Workbench

Workbench now includes the System management feature.

2022-07-22

All regions

System management (to be deprecated)

Copy images

You can cancel copy tasks for encrypted images.

2022-07-19

All regions

Copy a custom image

Connect to instances by using Alibaba Cloud Client

Use Alibaba Cloud Client to browse, search for, and remotely connect to resources such as ECS, Elastic Container Instance (ECI), Simple Application Server, and Alibaba Cloud managed instances.

2022-07-08

All regions

Overview of Alibaba Cloud Client

June 2022

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Operating system migration

Use the operating system migration feature to retain system disk data and minimize business downtime during the following migrations:

  • Migrate CentOS 7 to Alibaba Cloud Linux 2 or Anolis OS 7.

  • Migrate CentOS 8 to Alibaba Cloud Linux 3 or Anolis OS 8.

2022-06-17

All regions

Operating system migration (Linux)

Cloud Assistant supports scheduled commands

Cloud Assistant now supports scheduled commands for periodic tasks, routine maintenance, or one-time tasks that need to run at a specific time.

2022-06-02

All regions

May 2022

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Consistency Replication Groups

Consistency Replication Groups provide disaster recovery for applications with multiple cloud disks by centrally managing their asynchronous replication. This process ensures that all disks can be restored to the same point in time, enabling disaster recovery at the instance or multi-instance level.

2022-05-27

All regions

Overview of Consistency Replication Groups

Trunk ENI

A Trunk ENI is an elastic network interface (ENI) whose management is delegated to a service, such as Container Service for Kubernetes (ACK) or NAT Gateway.

2022-05-20

All regions

Trunk ENIs

March 2022

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Community images

Community images are public custom images shared by users. You can publish your own custom images or use those shared by others in the community.

2022-03-25

All regions

Community images

Session Manager

Session Manager, a feature of Cloud Assistant, offers a more convenient and secure way to remotely connect to ECS instances compared to SSH and VNC.

2022-03-22

Select regions

Connect to an instance by using Session Manager

February 2022

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Instance family

The gn7i GPU compute-optimized instance family now includes additional instance types.

2022-02-09

Select regions

Instance family

January 2022

Feature name

Description

Release date

Region

Related documentation

Instance family

The d3c big data compute-intensive instance family is now available.

2022-01-27

Select regions

Big data compute-intensive instance family d3c

2021

December 2021

Feature

Overview

Release date

Regions

Related documentation

Block storage

Asynchronous replication for cloud disks is a cross-region data protection feature that uses the data replication capabilities of block storage.

2021-12-01

Select regions

Disaster recovery for cloud disks

November 2021

Feature

Overview

Release date

Regions

Related documentation

Snapshot

The instance snapshot feature has been upgraded to the snapshot consistency group feature.

2021-11-30

All

Create a snapshot consistency group

Instance family

The ebmgn6ia GPU-accelerated elastic bare metal server instance family is now available.

2021-11-24

All

ebmgn6ia: GPU compute-optimized bare metal instance family

Instance family

The ebmg7a general-purpose, ebmc7a compute-optimized, and ebmr7a memory-optimized elastic bare metal server instance type families are now available.

2021-11-16

All

Instance family

Instance family

The ebmg7 general-purpose, ebmc7 compute-optimized, and ebmr7 memory-optimized elastic bare metal server instance type families are now available.

2021-11-16

All

Instance family

Instance family

The ebmgn7e GPU-accelerated elastic bare metal server instance family is now available.

2021-11-15

All

GPU-accelerated elastic bare metal instance family: ebmgn7e

Instance family

The sgn7i-vws GPU-virtualized instance family (with shared CPUs) is now available.

2021-11-15

All

sgn7i-vws, vGPU-accelerated instance family with shared CPUs

October 2021

Feature

Overview

Release date

Regions

Related documentation

Instance family

The g7se storage-enhanced general-purpose, c7se storage-enhanced compute-optimized, and r7se storage-enhanced memory-optimized instance type families are now available.

2021-10-29

Select regions

Instance family

September 2021

Feature

Overview

Release date

Regions

Related documentation

Cloud Assistant

Cloud Assistant can deliver task execution records to Object Storage Service (OSS) and Log Service (SLS).

2021-09-28

All

Deliver task execution records

Instance family

The vgn7i-vws GPU-virtualized instance family is now available. This instance family includes a software license for NVIDIA GRID vWS.

2021-09-15

All

vgn7i-vws, vGPU-accelerated instance family

August 2021

Feature

Overview

Release date

Regions

Related documentation

Community image

A community image is a public image. You can publish your custom images for other users to use, or use community images that others have published.

2021-08-11

Select regions

Community images

Image

Alibaba Cloud Linux 3 supports kernel live patching, which allows you to apply kernel patches to the operating system without restarting the server.

2021-08-10

All

Kernel live patching overview

Economical mode

The No-charge for stopped instances feature is renamed to Economical mode.

2021-08-09

All

Economical mode

July 2021

Feature

Description

Release date

Regions

Related documentation

Deployment set

The maximum number of ECS instances that can be created in a deployment set is increased from 7 to 20.

2021-07-29

All

Deployment sets

Resource Butler

You can use tag matching to refine the use of open private pools. This feature helps you integrate private pools with your existing tag-based design.

2021-07-19

All

Resource Butler overview

Instance family

The gn7i GPU-accelerated compute instance family is now available.

2021-07-01

All

Instance family

June 2021

Feature

Description

Release date

Regions

Related documentation

Image

Alibaba Cloud Linux 2 supports kernel live patching, which allows you to apply kernel patches to the operating system without restarting the server.

2021-06-30

All

Kernel live patching overview

Automatic restart

After you pay overdue bills, the system automatically restarts your instance. If the instance fails to restart automatically, you must start it manually.

2021-06-22

All

Start an instance

Instance family

The ebmgn7i GPU-accelerated elastic bare metal server instance family is now available.

2021-06-08

All

Ebmgn7i: GPU-accelerated bare metal instances

May 2021

Feature

Description

Release date

Regions

Related documentation

Instance family

The ebmc6me compute-optimized elastic bare metal server instance family is now available.

2021-05-28

Select regions

Compute-optimized bare metal instance family ebmc6me

Instance family

The g7a general-purpose, c7a compute-optimized, and r7a memory-optimized instance type families are now available.

2021-05-28

Select regions

Instance family

April 2021

Feature

Description

Release date

Regions

Related documentation

Instance family

The g7 general-purpose, c7 compute-optimized, and r7 memory-optimized instance type families are now available.

2021-04-19

Select regions

Instance family

Image

The Alibaba Cloud Linux 3 public image is now available.

2021-04-16

All

What is Alibaba Cloud Linux?

Reserved instance coupon

Reserved instance coupons now apply to more instance type families.

2021-04-15

All

Reserved instance coupons overview

Instance hibernation

The instance hibernation feature is now available. When you start a hibernated instance, it automatically restores the application's pre-hibernation state.

2021-04-06

Select regions

Hibernate an instance

Snapshot

You can use this feature to simultaneously create snapshots for multiple cloud disks on an ECS instance to ensure data consistency.

2021-04-06

Select regions

Create a snapshot consistency group

Snapshot

The application-consistent snapshot feature is now available. When you roll back data by using an application-consistent snapshot, the application is guaranteed to start in a consistent state.

2021-04-06

Select regions

Create an application-consistent snapshot

March 2021

Feature

Description

Release date

Regions

Related documentation

Instance family

The g7t security-enhanced general-purpose, c7t security-enhanced compute-optimized, and r7t security-enhanced memory-optimized instance type families are now available.

2021-03-31

Select regions

Instance family

The ebmhfg7 high-clock speed general-purpose, ebmhfc7 high-clock speed compute-optimized, and ebmhfr7 high-clock speed memory-optimized elastic bare metal server instance type families are now available.

2021-03-03

Select regions

Instance family

February 2021

Feature

Description

Release date

Regions

Related documentation

Instance family

The i3g local SSD-equipped instance family is now available.

2021-02-26

All

i3g, instance family with local SSDs

Instance family

The g7ne network-enhanced instance family is now available.

2021-02-09

Select regions

g7ne, network-enhanced general-purpose instance family

January 2021

Feature

Description

Release date

Regions

Related documentation

Instance family

The gn7 GPU-accelerated compute instance family is now available.

2021-01-12

Select regions

gn7, GPU-accelerated compute-optimized instance family

Image Builder

Image Builder is an ECS service for customizing images that supports cross-region and cross-account image customization.

2021-01-11

All

Image Builder

History

Table 1. December 2020

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Resource Assurance

Resource Assurance is a comprehensive service that guarantees the provision of resources to meet your business needs. It can be used to quantify the amount of available resources, reserve resources, and plan private pools.

2020-12-14

Some

Overview

Instant access

The instant access feature is available for public preview in the China (Hohhot) region.

2020-12-03

Some

Snapshot instant access

Table 2. November 2020

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Instance family

The re6p persistent memory-optimized instance family is released.

2020-11-04

Some

Instance family

Instance family

The i3 instance family with local SSDs is released.

2020-11-03

Some

Instance family

Table 3. October 2020

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Instance family

The g6se storage-enhanced instance family is released.

2020-10-23

Some

Instance family

Table 4. September 2020

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Spot instance

A spot instance can be configured to have no protection period when it is created by calling an API operation.

2020-09-25

All

Savings plan

Savings plans are provided as discount plans that can be applied to offset the bills of pay-as-you-go instances, excluding spot instances.

2020-09-18

All

Instance family

The g6t security-enhanced general-purpose instance family and c6t security-enhanced compute-optimized instance family are released.

2020-09-08

Some

Instance family

The g6a general-purpose instance family, c6a compute-optimized instance family, and r6a memory-optimized instance family are released.

2020-09-07

Some

Instance family

Instance family

The ebmg6a general-purpose ECS Bare Metal Instance family, ebmc6a compute-optimized ECS Bare Metal Instance family, and ebmr6a memory-optimized ECS Bare Metal Instance family are released.

2020-09-07

Some

Instance family

Table 5. August 2020

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Tag

Tags can be added to more resources, including reserved instances.

2020-08-18

All

Tags

Snapshot

Snapshots can be replicated across regions to improve service reliability and availability.

2020-08-14

Some

Copy a snapshot

Table 6. July 2020

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Image family

The image family feature is released to facilitate smooth upgrade and rollback of images.

2020-07-02

All

Overview

Table 7. June 2020

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Instance family

The d2c compute-intensive big data instance family is released.

2020-06-23

Some

Instance family

Instance family

The scchfc6 compute-optimized Super Computing Cluster (SCC) instance family with high clock speeds, scchfg6 general-purpose SCC instance family with high clock speeds, and scchfr6 memory-optimized SCC instance family with high clock speeds are released.

2020-06-23

All

Retired instance types

Instance family

The ebmc6e compute-optimized ECS Bare Metal Instance family with enhanced performance, ebmg6e general-purpose ECS Bare Metal Instance family with enhanced performance, and ebmr6e memory-optimized ECS Bare Metal Instance family with enhanced performance are released.

2020-06-23

All

Instance family

Storage capacity unit (SCU)

SCUs can be used to offset the pay-as-you-go bills of different storage resources, such as disks, Object Storage Service (OSS) buckets, Apsara File Storage NAS file systems, and snapshots.

2020-06-23

All

Storage Capacity Unit (SCU)

Elastic Block Storage (EBS)

The sequence numbers of disks attached to ECS instances can be queried.

2020-06-16

All

Query serial number

Network

Virtual private clouds (VPCs) of ECS instances can be changed in the ECS console. This feature is in invitational preview.

2020-06-10

Some

Change the VPC for an ECS instance

Enhanced SSD (ESSD)

ESSDs at the performance level 0 (PL0 ESSDs) are in public preview in the China (Hangzhou) and China (Beijing) regions.

2020-06-10

Some

Local disk-related system event

System events about local disk damages can be queried and damaged local disks can be isolated in the ECS console.

2020-06-09

All

Isolate or repair a local disk

Instance family

The hfg7 general-purpose instance family with high clock speeds, hfc7 compute-optimized instance family with high clock speeds, and hfr7 memory-optimized instance family with high clock speeds are released.

2020-06-09

Some

Instance family

Instance family

The g6e general-purpose instance family with enhanced performance, c6e compute-optimized instance family with enhanced performance, and r6e memory-optimized instance family with enhanced performance are released.

2020-06-09

All

Instance family

Instance family

The ebmre6p non-volatile memory-optimized ECS Bare Metal Instance family with enhanced performance is released.

2020-06-09

Some

Instance family

Table 8. May 2020

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Image

Technical support for the CoreOS Container Linux public images is discontinued. CoreOS Container Linux has reached its end of life, and no more security patches are provided. For security concerns, we recommend that you no longer use CoreOS Container Linux images. Alibaba Cloud will soon release Fedora CoreOS public images as a replacement.

2020-05-26

All

Release notes

Reserved instance

The normalization factors of instance types can be queried to help understand the computing power requirements in the splitting and merging of reserved instances and the size flexibility of regional reserved instances.

2020-05-14

All

Table 9. April 2020

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Instance family

The ebmre6-6t memory-optimized ECS Bare Metal Instance family with enhanced performance is released.

2020-04-28

All

Instance family

Instance family

The re6 memory-optimized instance family with enhanced performance is released.

2020-04-20

Some

Instance family

Table 10. March 2020

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Instance family

The i2ne and i2gne instance families with local SSDs are released.

2020-03-11

All

Instance family

Table 12. January 2020

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Tag

A wide range of tag features are provided. Tags can be used to control permissions of Resource Access Management (RAM) users. Tags can be added and modified by using Operation Orchestration Service (OOS).

2020-01-03

All

Tags

Instance family

The d2s storage-intensive big data instance family is released.

2020-01-17

Some

Instance family

Instance family

The vgn6i lightweight GPU-accelerated compute-optimized instance family is released.

2020-01-16

Some

vGPU-accelerated instance family vgn6i

Instance family

The s6 shared standard instance family is released.

2020-01-16

Some

Instance family

Image

Technical support for the Windows Server 2008 and Windows Server 2008 R2 public images is discontinued. We recommend that you upgrade to Windows Server 2012 or later at your earliest convenience.

2020-01-14

All

Public images

Table 13. December 2019

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

SCU

40 GiB, 100 GiB, and 500 GiB are added as capacity options for SCUs.

2019-12-05

Some

Storage Capacity Unit (SCU)

Table 14. November 2019

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Tag

The tag editor feature is released. Up to 5,000 resource data entries across services and regions can be queried. The tags of resources can be edited, and resource information can be exported.

2019-11-28

All

Tags

Snapshot

The quota for automatic snapshots is increased to 1,000.

2019-11-15

All

Overview

Instance family

The gn6e GPU-accelerated compute-optimized instance family is released.

2019-11-14

Some

Instance family

Instance family

The ebmgn6e GPU-accelerated compute-optimized ECS Bare Metal Instance family is released.

2019-11-14

Some

Instance family

Instance family

The sccgn6ne GPU-accelerated compute-optimized SCC instance family is released.

2019-11-14

Some

GPU compute-optimized instance family sccgn6ne

Table 15. October 2019

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Instance family

The hfc6, hfg6, and hfr6 instance families with high clock speeds are released.

2019-10-15

Some

Instance family

Instance family

The ebmhfc6, ebmhfg6, and ebmhfr6 ECS Bare Metal Instance families are released.

2019-10-10

All

Instance family

Table 16. September 2019

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Disk resizing

  • Standard SSDs and ultra disks can be resized to up to 32 TiB.

  • ESSDs can be resized online.

2019-09-26

All

Instance family

The ebmc6, ebmg6, and ebmr6 ECS Bare Metal Instance families are released.

2019-09-24

All

Instance family

Instance family

The t6 burstable instance family is released.

2019-09-12

Some

Instance family

Security group

The maximum number of security group rules that a security group can contain is increased to 200.

2019-09-03

All

Limits

Snapshot

The individual quotas for manual snapshots and automatic snapshots are increased to 256.

2019-09-02

All

Overview

Table 17. August 2019

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Instance family

The ebmgn6v GPU-accelerated compute-optimized ECS Bare Metal Instance family is released.

2019-08-26

Some

Instance family

Instance family

The ebmgn6i GPU-accelerated compute-optimized ECS Bare Metal Instance family is released.

2019-08-26

Some

Instance family

Image

The image export feature is available in all Alibaba Cloud regions.

2019-08-21

All

Export a custom image

Snapshot

The snapshot service is available for commercial use. All existing and new snapshots are billed on a pay-as-you-go basis.

2019-08-21

All

Snapshot billing

Table 18. July 2019

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Instance family

The g6 general-purpose instance family is released.

2019-07-30

Some

Instance family

Instance family

The c6 compute-optimized instance family is released.

2019-07-30

Some

Instance family

Instance family

The r6 memory-optimized instance family is released.

2019-07-30

Some

Instance family

Instance family

The ebmc5s network-enhanced compute-optimized ECS Bare Metal Instance family is released.

2019-07-30

Some

Instance family

Instance family

The ebmg5s network-enhanced general-purpose ECS Bare Metal Instance family is released.

2019-07-30

Some

Instance family

Instance family

The ebmr5s network-enhanced memory-optimized ECS Bare Metal Instance family is released.

2019-07-30

Some

Instance family

Table 19. June 2019

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Auto Provisioning

Auto Provisioning uses auto provisioning groups to schedule and maintain computing resources. This makes it easy to deploy clusters of instances across billing methods, instance types, and zones.

2019-06-28

All

Overview

ESSD

The ESSD service is available for commercial use after the public preview is complete. Three performance levels of ESSDs are released.

2019-06-28

Some. For more information about the supported regions, see FAQ about Elastic Block Storage.

ESSDs

vgn5i, lightweight GPU-accelerated compute-optimized instance family

GRID drivers are provided for vgn5i instances.

2019-06-19

All

vGPU instance family vgn5i

Table 20. May 2019

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

EBS

Subscription disks can be created by calling API operations.

2019-05-15

All

CreateDisk

Table 21. April 2019

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Elastic network interface (ENI)

A single ENI can be assigned multiple private IP addresses.

2019-04-28

All

Secondary private IPs

EBS

Data disks of an ECS instance can be resized online to meet storage requirements without restarting the instance.

2019-04-24

All

Step 1: Resize a disk to extend the disk capacity

EBS

System disks can be resized.

2019-04-24

All

Resize cloud disks

Snapshot

Snapshots can be created for expired disks.

2019-04-20

All

Table 22. March 2019

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Public image

Aliyun Linux 2 public images are released.

2019-03-27

All

What is Alibaba Cloud Linux

Instance family

The gn6i GPU-accelerated compute-optimized instance family is released.

2019-03-21

All

Instance family

Instance family

The sccgn6 GPU-accelerated compute-optimized SCC instance family is released.

2019-03-20

All

GPU compute-optimized SCC instance family sccgn6

Instance family

The vgn5i lightweight GPU-accelerated compute-optimized instance family is released.

2019-03-19

All

Instance family

Reserved instance

The reserved instance feature is in invitational preview.

2019-03-18

All

Overview

Cloud Assistant

Cloud Assistant is available for ECS instances in the classic network.

2019-03-01

All

Install the Cloud Assistant Agent

Table 23. January 2019

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Event notification

Status change events and alert events for the recycling of spot instances are supported.

2019-01-29

All

Overview of ECS system events

Table 24. December 2018

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Cloud Assistant

Cloud Assistant is available in the UK (London) region.

2018-12-31

All

Cloud Assistant overview

Spot instance

Spot instances are billed by second.

2018-12-17

All

What is spot instance?

Instance

The release protection feature is supported.

2018-12-14

All

Enable and disable instance release protection

ENI

The DescribeNetworkInterfaces operation can be called to query the public IP address associated with an ENI.

2018-12-04

All

DescribeNetworkInterfaces

Table 25. November 2018

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Custom image

Packer can be used to create custom images.

2018-11-30

All

Create custom image with Packer

Instance family

The re4e high memory instance family is released.

2018-11-30

All

Instance family

EBS

Subscription disks can be separately created and attached to subscription instances.

2018-11-29

All

Create a data disk

Deployment set

The deployment set feature is released.

2018-11-16

All

Deployment sets

Table 26. October 2018

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Instance family

The f3 FPGA-accelerated compute-optimized instance family is released.

2018-10-31

All

FPGA compute-optimized instance family F3

API best practices

API best practices are released in the ECS console.

2018-10-19

All

Create an instance with Custom Launch

Table 27. September 2018

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

t5, burstable instance family

Unlimited mode is available for the t5 burstable instance family.

2018-09-30

All

Unlimited mode

Instance metadata

Information of O&M system events is included in instance metadata.

2018-09-14

All

Instance metadata

Instance health status

The health status of each ECS instance is displayed on the instance details page.

2018-09-14

All

View instance health status

Instance family

The gn6v new-generation GPU-accelerated instance family (V100 model) is released.

2018-09-12

All

Instance family

Instance purchase

Multiple instances can be renewed at a time, and historical instances can be purchased.

2018-09-07

All

How to renew a subscription ECS instance

System event

API operations used to create or cancel simulated events are released.

2018-09-03

All

Billing method

Subscription instances can be changed into pay-as-you-go instances.

2018-09-01

All

Change from Subscription to Pay-as-you-go

Table 28. August 2018

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Local disk

The O&M of instances that have local disks attached is optimized.

2018-08-31

All

Local disks

Cloud Assistant

Cloud Assistant is supported in the ECS console.

2018-08-17

All

Cloud Assistant overview

Instance family

SCC instance families are released.

2018-08-16

All

Instance family

Table 29. July 2018

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Custom image

Images in the qcow2 format can be imported.

2018-07-30

All

Security group

Security group rules can be modified.

2018-07-25

All

Modify security group rules

Tag

Tags can be added to resources when the resources are created.

2018-07-20

All

Tags

Instance family

The ebmc4 compute-optimized ECS Bare Metal Instance family is released.

2018-07-18

All

Compute-optimized ECS Bare Metal Instance family ebmc4

Snapshot

The estimated remaining time required to create snapshots is displayed.

2018-07-17

All

Manually create a single snapshot

Account and user privileges

Quota management is supported.

2018-07-15

All

Manage ECS quotas

ESSD

The ESSD service is in public preview in Beijing Zone G.

2018-07-14

Beijing Zone G

Disks

Instance troubleshooting

System logs and screenshots can be viewed.

2018-07-13

All

View instance system logs and screenshots

Security group

A ticket can be submitted to modify the maximum numbers of instances and security group rules that can be added to a security group.

2018-07-10

All

Limits

Instance family

The ic5 compute-intensive instance family is released.

2018-07-09

All

Instance family

Table 30. June 2018

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Public image

Operating systems including Red Hat can be selected from public images to create ECS instances.

2018-06-29

All

Create an instance with Custom Launch

Instance configuration upgrade

The configurations of pay-as-you-go instances can be upgraded or downgraded across instance families.

2018-06-15

All

Instance type change limitations and pre-checks

Billing method

Subscription instances can be renewed on a weekly basis.

2018-06-12

All

How to renew a subscription ECS instance

Security group

Security groups in the classic network can be cloned to a VPC.

2018-06-06

All

Clone a security group

Active O&M

Phase 2 of active O&M is brought online.

2018-06-01

All

Overview of ECS system events

Table 31. May 2018

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Custom image

The image compliance tool is released.

2018-05-28

All

Check and fix image

System event

ECS system events are updated to CloudMonitor and can be queried.

2018-05-25

All

Overview of ECS system events

Launch template

The launch template feature is released.

2018-05-11

All

Create a launch template

Table 32. April 2018

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Billing method

Pay-as-you-go instances can be changed into subscription instances.

2018-04-23

All

Change the billing method from pay-as-you-go to subscription

Instance configuration downgrade

The configurations of expired subscription instances can be downgraded while the instances are being renewed.

2018-04-13

All

Renew and downgrade

Table 33. March 2018

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

GPU-accelerated instance

NVIDIA GPU Cloud (NGC) GPU-accelerated containers are supported.

2018-03-28

All

Deploy an NGC environment for deep learning development

System event

The system event feature is released.

2018-03-26

All

Overview of ECS system events

ECS Bare Metal Instance

ECS Bare Metal Instance is released.

2018-03-14

All

Elastic bare metal server specifications

Instance identity

The ECS instance identity feature is released.

2018-03-01

All

Instance dynamic data (instance identity)

Table 34. February 2018

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

ECS API

The API operation used to check whether the configurations of ECS instances can be upgraded or downgraded is released.

2018-02-10

All

DescribeResourcesModification

Subscription instance

The number of days during which an instance stays expired before it is released is extended from 7 to 15.

2018-02-07

All

Subscription

ECS API

API operations used to create and query resources are released.

2018-02-02

All

DescribeAvailableResource

Table 36. December 2017

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

No Fees for Stopped Instances (VPC-Connected)

The No Fees for Stopped Instances (VPC-Connected) feature is supported for pay-as-you-go instances.

2017-12-14

All

Economical mode

ENI

The ENI feature is released.

2017-12-08

All

Overview

ECS API

The API operation used to batch create instances is released.

2017-12-01

All

RunInstances

Instance troubleshooting

The real-time diagnostics feature is supported in the ECS console.

2017-12-01

All

Automatic diagnostics system

Table 37. November 2017

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Cloud Migration tool

The Cloud Migration tool is released.

2017-11-27

All

What is Server Migration Center

Security group rule

Security group rules can be imported and exported.

2017-11-23

All

Manage security group rules

Subscription instance

The auto-renewal feature can be disabled for subscription instances.

2017-11-23

All

ModifyInstanceAutoRenewAttribute

Billing method

API operations used to create and renew weekly subscription instances are released.

2017-11-03

All

CreateInstance

Instance RAM role

RAM roles can be assigned to ECS instances.

2017-11-01

All

Instance RAM roles

Table 38. October 2017

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Elastic IP Address (EIP)

The public IP addresses of instances in VPCs can be converted into EIPs.

2017-10-31

All

Convert the static public IP address of an instance in a VPC to an EIP

Spot instance

The spot instance feature is released.

2017-10-18

All

What is spot instance?

t5, burstable instance family

The t5 burstable instance family is released.

2017-10-09

All

Burstable instances

Table 39. September 2017

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Billing method

Bills of pay-as-you-go instances and disks are accurate to the second and generated by hour.

2017-09-29

All

Pay-as-you-go

gn5i instance family

The gn5i GPU-accelerated compute-optimized instance family is released. It is applicable to deep learning and online inference scenarios.

2017-09-23

All

Instance family

Disk encryption

Disks can be encrypted.

2017-09-05

All

Encryption overview

Table 40. August 2017

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Security group rule

Security group rules can be configured based on 5-tuples.

2017-08-31

All

Security group quintuple rules

ClassicLink

ClassicLink allows instances in the classic network to be connected to instances in VPCs.

2017-08-25

All

Network types

Instance family

The new-generation instance families with high clock speeds and instance families with local SSDs are released. They are powered by Skylake processors and support 25 Gigabit Ethernet.

2017-08-22

All

Instance family

ECS API

The API operation used to change the bandwidth configurations of instances is released.

2017-08-17

All

ModifyInstanceNetworkSpec

Custom image

Custom images can be imported.

2017-08-10

All

Import a custom image

Table 41. July 2017

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Image

Technical support for the Windows Server 2003 public images is discontinued. We recommend that you upgrade to Windows Server 2012 or later at your earliest convenience.

2017-07-20

All

Public images

Security group

Security group rules can be configured to isolate the instances in a security group from each other.

2017-07-07

All

Modify the internal access control policy of a basic security group

Table 42. June 2017

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Classic network

The classic network is unavailable for users who create ECS instances at or after 12:00:00 on June 16, 2017 (UTC+8) for the first time. We recommend that you use VPC.

2017-06-16

All

What is VPC

Table 43. May 2017

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Instance RAM role

The API operation used to manage instance RAM roles is released.

2017-05-26

All

Instance RAM roles

Instance family

The network-enhanced instance family is released.

2017-05-23

All

Instance family

Instance family

The d1 storage-intensive instance family is released.

2017-05-12

All

Instance family

Security group

The default security group rule is modified to expose only Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) ports, Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) port 22, and TCP port 3389.

2017-05-11

All

Overview

Security group

Security groups can be backed up, overwritten, and restored.

2017-05-10

All

Restore security group rules

Table 44. April 2017

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

SSH key pair

The SSH key pair feature is released.

2017-04-25

All

Overview

Table 45. February 2017

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Custom image

cloud-init supports some custom images.

2017-02-24

All

Install cloud-init

Instance family

The i1 I/O optimized instance family with local SSDs is released.

2017-02-17

All

Instance family

Snapshot

System disk snapshots can be used to create data disks.

2017-02-15

All

Create a data disk from a snapshot

Instance family

The gn4 GPU-accelerated compute-optimized instance family is released.

2017-02-14

All

Gn4 GPU compute instance family

Table 46. January 2017

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Instance family

The ga1 GPU-accelerated visualization and compute-optimized instance family is released.

2017-01-24

All

Ga1 GPU visual computing instance family

Instance family

The se1 dedicated instance family is released.

2017-01-21

All

Instance family

Table 47. 2016

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Snapshot

Snapshot 2.0 is released.

2016-03-15

All

Overview

Disk resizing

System disks can be resized.

2016-01-15

All

Resize cloud disks

Table 48. 2015

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

Custom image

Custom images can be imported.

2015-12-15

All

Instructions for importing image

Security group

Security groups are supported in the ECS console.

2015-11-02

All

Create a security group

Alibaba Cloud Marketplace image

Alibaba Cloud Marketplace images are available for commercial use.

2015-09-02

All

Alibaba Cloud Marketplace images

Tag

The tag feature is released.

2015-08-20

All

Tags

System disk

The operating systems of pay-as-you-go instances can be replaced.

2015-08-13

All

Replace system disk (OS)

Custom image

Custom images can be shared.

2015-05-15

All

Share or unshare a custom image

Disk resizing

Disks can be resized offline.

2015-04-20

All

Overview

Custom image

The image replication feature is released.

2015-01-26

All

Copy a custom image

Table 49. 2014

Feature

Description

Release date

Region

References

EBS

The independent disk feature is released.

2014-08-22

All

Elastic Block Storage devices