AWS CloudWatch is a monitoring and observability service that provides real-time insights into AWS resources, applications, and infrastructure. It helps track metrics, collect and analyze logs, set alarms, and automate responses to system changes.
Key Features of AWS CloudWatch
- Metrics Monitoring – Collects and tracks metrics from AWS services (EC2, Lambda, S3, etc.) and custom applications.
- Alarms & Notifications – Triggers alarms based on defined thresholds and integrates with SNS, Lambda, or Auto Scaling.
- Log Management (CloudWatch Logs) – Collects, monitors, and analyzes logs from AWS services and applications.
- CloudWatch Dashboards – Customizable dashboards to visualize performance and system health.
- CloudWatch Events & EventBridge – Automates responses to AWS events (e.g., auto-restart EC2 on failure).
- CloudWatch Synthetics – Monitors application endpoints for availability and latency.
- ServiceLens (for Observability) – Provides end-to-end visibility into distributed applications, integrating with AWS X-Ray.
- Anomaly Detection – Uses machine learning to detect unusual activity in metrics.