Comparing Cost and Performance of Microservices and Serverless in AWS: EC2 vs Lambda

Christopher Allen; Xiaozhou Li; Amr S. Abdelfattah; Tomas Cerny; Davide Taibi

doi:10.1007/978-3-031-61816-1_5

Comparing Cost and Performance of Microservices and Serverless in AWS: EC2 vs Lambda

Christopher Allen, Xiaozhou Li, Amr S. Abdelfattah, Tomas Cerny, Davide Taibi

Computing Sciences

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Conference contribution › Scientific › peer-review

Abstract

Serverless functions introduce a new way of running cloud-native systems suggesting a reduction in operational costs and delegating scalability to the cloud providers. However, while several companies are adopting serverless functions, it is still unclear if they have a competitive advantage compared to services deployed on docker containers. To compare the performance and the costs of serverless functions and microservices, we introduce a case study comparing microservice-based and serverless-based applications. We compare their performance and cost when each of its services is deployed in a docker container running on AWS EC2 or as a serverless function in AWS Lambda. Our study shows that the serverless functions performed better over time compared to the microservice version after initially having a slower response time. The microservice performance got worse over time, implying that the serverless functions are better suited for larger volumes of internet traffic. Results also indicated that the serverless functions are cheaper to operate than the microservices when the number of monthly requests is limited.

Original language	English
Title of host publication	Next Generation Data Science - 2nd Southwest Data Science Conference, SDSC 2023, Revised Selected Papers
Editors	Henry Han, Erich Baker
Publisher	Springer
Pages	60-72
Number of pages	13
ISBN (Print)	9783031618154
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-61816-1_5
Publication status	Published - 2024
Publication type	A4 Article in conference proceedings
Event	Southwest Data Science Conference - Waco, United States Duration: 24 Mar 2024 → 25 Mar 2024

Publication series

Name	Communications in Computer and Information Science
Volume	2113 CCIS
ISSN (Print)	1865-0929
ISSN (Electronic)	1865-0937

Conference

Conference	Southwest Data Science Conference
Country/Territory	United States
City	Waco
Period	24/03/24 → 25/03/24

Keywords

AWS
Case Study
Cost
Microservice
Performance
Serverless

Publication forum classification

Publication forum level 1

ASJC Scopus subject areas

General Computer Science
General Mathematics

Access to Document

10.1007/978-3-031-61816-1_5

Cite this

Allen, C., Li, X., Abdelfattah, A. S., Cerny, T., & Taibi, D. (2024). Comparing Cost and Performance of Microservices and Serverless in AWS: EC2 vs Lambda. In H. Han, & E. Baker (Eds.), Next Generation Data Science - 2nd Southwest Data Science Conference, SDSC 2023, Revised Selected Papers (pp. 60-72). (Communications in Computer and Information Science; Vol. 2113 CCIS). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-61816-1_5

Allen, Christopher ; Li, Xiaozhou ; Abdelfattah, Amr S. et al. / Comparing Cost and Performance of Microservices and Serverless in AWS : EC2 vs Lambda. Next Generation Data Science - 2nd Southwest Data Science Conference, SDSC 2023, Revised Selected Papers. editor / Henry Han ; Erich Baker. Springer, 2024. pp. 60-72 (Communications in Computer and Information Science).

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title = "Comparing Cost and Performance of Microservices and Serverless in AWS: EC2 vs Lambda",

abstract = "Serverless functions introduce a new way of running cloud-native systems suggesting a reduction in operational costs and delegating scalability to the cloud providers. However, while several companies are adopting serverless functions, it is still unclear if they have a competitive advantage compared to services deployed on docker containers. To compare the performance and the costs of serverless functions and microservices, we introduce a case study comparing microservice-based and serverless-based applications. We compare their performance and cost when each of its services is deployed in a docker container running on AWS EC2 or as a serverless function in AWS Lambda. Our study shows that the serverless functions performed better over time compared to the microservice version after initially having a slower response time. The microservice performance got worse over time, implying that the serverless functions are better suited for larger volumes of internet traffic. Results also indicated that the serverless functions are cheaper to operate than the microservices when the number of monthly requests is limited.",

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Allen, C, Li, X, Abdelfattah, AS, Cerny, T & Taibi, D 2024, Comparing Cost and Performance of Microservices and Serverless in AWS: EC2 vs Lambda. in H Han & E Baker (eds), Next Generation Data Science - 2nd Southwest Data Science Conference, SDSC 2023, Revised Selected Papers. Communications in Computer and Information Science, vol. 2113 CCIS, Springer, pp. 60-72, Southwest Data Science Conference, Waco, United States, 24/03/24. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-61816-1_5

Comparing Cost and Performance of Microservices and Serverless in AWS: EC2 vs Lambda. / Allen, Christopher; Li, Xiaozhou; Abdelfattah, Amr S. et al.
Next Generation Data Science - 2nd Southwest Data Science Conference, SDSC 2023, Revised Selected Papers. ed. / Henry Han; Erich Baker. Springer, 2024. p. 60-72 (Communications in Computer and Information Science; Vol. 2113 CCIS).

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Conference contribution › Scientific › peer-review

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Allen C, Li X, Abdelfattah AS, Cerny T, Taibi D. Comparing Cost and Performance of Microservices and Serverless in AWS: EC2 vs Lambda. In Han H, Baker E, editors, Next Generation Data Science - 2nd Southwest Data Science Conference, SDSC 2023, Revised Selected Papers. Springer. 2024. p. 60-72. (Communications in Computer and Information Science). doi: 10.1007/978-3-031-61816-1_5