On-Demand
Pay-as-you-go compute with no commitment — the baseline every other price is measured against.
On-Demand is the default EC2 pricing model: you pay a fixed hourly (or per-second) rate for capacity with no upfront payment and no long-term commitment, and you can stop paying the moment you terminate the instance.
It is the most flexible and the most expensive per hour. On-Demand is the right choice for spiky, short-lived, or unpredictable workloads — and it is the benchmark this explorer uses to express every Reserved, Savings Plan, and Spot discount as a percentage off On-Demand.
FAQ
Is On-Demand the cheapest EC2 option?
No — it is the most expensive per hour. Reserved Instances and Savings Plans trade a 1- or 3-year commitment for discounts of roughly 30–70%, and Spot can be cheaper still but is interruptible.