Example policies to control access the Amazon EC2 API

You can use IAM policies to grant users the permissions required to work with Amazon EC2. For step-by-step directions, see Creating IAM policies in the IAM User Guide.

The following examples show policy statements that you could use to grant users permissions to use Amazon EC2. These policies are designed for requests that are made using the AWS CLI or an AWS SDK. In the following examples, replace each user input placeholder with your own information.

For example policies for working in the Amazon EC2 console, see Example policies to control access to the Amazon EC2 console.

Example: Read-only access

The following policy grants users permissions to use all Amazon EC2 API actions whose names begin with Describe. The Resource element uses a wildcard to indicate that users can specify all resources with these API actions. The * wildcard is also necessary in cases where the API action does not support resource-level permissions. For more information about which ARNs you can use with which Amazon EC2 API actions, see Actions, resources, and condition keys for Amazon EC2.

Users don't have permission to perform any actions on the resources (unless another statement grants them permission to do so) because they're denied permission to use API actions by default.

JSON

{
   "Version":"2012-10-17",
   "Statement": [
    {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": "ec2:Describe*",
      "Resource": "*"
    }
   ]
}

Example: Restrict access to a specific Region

The following policy denies users permission to use all Amazon EC2 API actions unless the Region is Europe (Frankfurt). It uses the global condition key aws:RequestedRegion, which is supported by all Amazon EC2 API actions.

JSON

{
  "Version":"2012-10-17",
  "Statement": [
       {
      "Effect": "Deny",
      "Action": "ec2:*",
      "Resource": "*",
      "Condition": {
        "StringNotEquals": {
          "aws:RequestedRegion": "eu-central-1"
        }
      }
    }  
  ]
}

Alternatively, you can use the condition key ec2:Region, which is specific to Amazon EC2 and is supported by all Amazon EC2 API actions.

JSON

{
  "Version":"2012-10-17",
  "Statement": [
       {
      "Effect": "Deny",
      "Action": "ec2:*",
      "Resource": "*",
      "Condition": {
        "StringNotEquals": {
          "ec2:Region": "eu-central-1"
        }
      }
    }  
  ]
}

Work with instances

Example: Describe, launch, stop, start, and terminate all instances

The following policy grants users permissions to use the API actions specified in the Action element. The Resource element uses a * wildcard to indicate that users can specify all resources with these API actions. The * wildcard is also necessary in cases where the API action does not support resource-level permissions. For more information about which ARNs you can use with which Amazon EC2 API actions, see Actions, resources, and condition keys for Amazon EC2.

The users don't have permission to use any other API actions (unless another statement grants them permission to do so) because users are denied permission to use API actions by default.

JSON

{
   "Version":"2012-10-17",
   "Statement": [
    {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": [
        "ec2:DescribeInstances", 
        "ec2:DescribeImages",
        "ec2:DescribeKeyPairs", 
        "ec2:DescribeSecurityGroups",
        "ec2:DescribeAvailabilityZones",
        "ec2:RunInstances", 
        "ec2:TerminateInstances",
        "ec2:StopInstances", 
        "ec2:StartInstances"
      ],
      "Resource": "*"
    }
   ]
}

Example: Describe all instances, and stop, start, and terminate only particular instances

The following policy allows users to describe all instances, to start and stop only instances i-1234567890abcdef0 and i-0598c7d356eba48d7, and to terminate only instances in the us-east-1 Region, with the resource tag "purpose=test".

The first statement uses a * wildcard for the Resource element to indicate that users can specify all resources with the action; in this case, they can list all instances. The * wildcard is also necessary in cases where the API action does not support resource-level permissions (in this case, ec2:DescribeInstances). For more information about which ARNs you can use with which Amazon EC2 API actions, see Actions, resources, and condition keys for Amazon EC2.

The second statement uses resource-level permissions for the StopInstances and StartInstances actions. The specific instances are indicated by their ARNs in the Resource element.

The third statement allows users to terminate all instances in the us-east-1 Region that belong to the specified AWS account, but only where the instance has the tag "purpose=test". The Condition element qualifies when the policy statement is in effect.

JSON

{
   "Version":"2012-10-17",
   "Statement": [
   {
   "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": "ec2:DescribeInstances",
      "Resource": "*"
   },
   {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": [
        "ec2:StopInstances", 
        "ec2:StartInstances"
      ],
      "Resource": [
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:instance/i-1234567890abcdef0",
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:instance/i-0598c7d356eba48d7"
      ]
    },
    {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": "ec2:TerminateInstances",
      "Resource": "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:instance/*",
      "Condition": {
         "StringEquals": {
            "aws:ResourceTag/purpose": "test"
         }
      }
   }

   ]
}

Launch instances (RunInstances)

The RunInstances API action launches one or more On-Demand Instances or one or more Spot Instances. RunInstances requires an AMI and creates an instance. Users can specify a key pair and security group in the request. Launching into a VPC requires a subnet, and creates a network interface. Launching from an Amazon EBS-backed AMI creates a volume. Therefore, the user must have permissions to use these Amazon EC2 resources. You can create a policy statement that requires users to specify an optional parameter on RunInstances, or restricts users to particular values for a parameter.

For more information about the resource-level permissions that are required to launch an instance, see Actions, resources, and condition keys for Amazon EC2.

By default, users don't have permissions to describe, start, stop, or terminate the resulting instances. One way to grant the users permission to manage the resulting instances is to create a specific tag for each instance, and then create a statement that enables them to manage instances with that tag. For more information, see Work with instances.

AMIs

The following policy allows users to launch instances using only the specified AMIs, ami-9e1670f7 and ami-45cf5c3c. The users can't launch an instance using other AMIs (unless another statement grants the users permission to do so).

JSON

{
   "Version":"2012-10-17",
   "Statement": [
   {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": "ec2:RunInstances",
      "Resource": [
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1::image/ami-9e1670f7",
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1::image/ami-45cf5c3c",
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:instance/*",
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:volume/*",
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:key-pair/*",
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:security-group/*",
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:subnet/*",
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:network-interface/*"
      ]
    }
   ]
}

Alternatively, the following policy allows users to launch instances from all AMIs owned by Amazon, or certain trusted and verified partners. The Condition element of the first statement tests whether ec2:Owner is amazon. The users can't launch an instance using other AMIs (unless another statement grants the users permission to do so).

JSON

{
   "Version":"2012-10-17",
   "Statement": [
         {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": "ec2:RunInstances",
      "Resource": [ 
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1::image/ami-*"
      ],
      "Condition": {
         "StringEquals": {
            "ec2:Owner": "amazon"
         }
      }
   },
   {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": "ec2:RunInstances",
      "Resource": [ 
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:instance/*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:subnet/*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:volume/*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:network-interface/*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:key-pair/*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:security-group/*"
         ]
      }
   ]
}

Instance types

The following policy allows users to launch instances using only the t2.micro or t2.small instance type, which you might do to control costs. The users can't launch larger instances because the Condition element of the first statement tests whether ec2:InstanceType is either t2.micro or t2.small.

JSON

{
   "Version":"2012-10-17",
   "Statement": [
        {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": "ec2:RunInstances",
      "Resource": [
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:instance/*"
      ],
      "Condition": {
         "StringEquals": {
            "ec2:InstanceType": ["t2.micro", "t2.small"]
         }
      }
   },
   {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": "ec2:RunInstances",
      "Resource": [
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1::image/ami-*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:subnet/*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:network-interface/*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:volume/*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:key-pair/*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:security-group/*"
         ]
      }
   ]
}

Alternatively, you can create a policy that denies users permissions to launch any instances except t2.micro and t2.small instance types.

JSON

{
   "Version":"2012-10-17",
   "Statement": [
        { 
      "Effect": "Deny",
      "Action": "ec2:RunInstances",
      "Resource": [
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:instance/*"
      ],
      "Condition": {
         "StringNotEquals": {
            "ec2:InstanceType": ["t2.micro", "t2.small"]
         }
      }
   },
   {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": "ec2:RunInstances",
      "Resource": [
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1::image/ami-*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:network-interface/*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:instance/*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:subnet/*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:volume/*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:key-pair/*",
         "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:security-group/*"
         ]
      }
   ]
}

Subnets

The following policy allows users to launch instances using only the specified subnet, subnet-12345678. The group can't launch instances into any another subnet (unless another statement grants the users permission to do so).

JSON

{
   "Version":"2012-10-17",
   "Statement": [
    {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": "ec2:RunInstances",
      "Resource": [
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:subnet/subnet-12345678",
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:network-interface/*",
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:instance/*",
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:volume/*",
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1::image/ami-*",
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:key-pair/*",
        "arn:aws:ec2:us-east-1:111122223333:security-group/*"
      ]
    }
   ]
}

Alternatively, you could create a policy that denies users permissions to launch an instance into any other subnet. The statement does this by denying permission to create a network interface, except where subnet subnet-12345678 is specified. This denial overrides any other policies that are created to allow launching instances into other subnets.

JSON