What is AWS ParallelCluster?
AWS ParallelCluster is an AWS-supported open-source tool for building and managing High Performance Computing (HPC) clusters in the AWS Cloud. It automates setup of the required compute resources, job scheduler, and a shared file system, letting you quickly build both proof-of-concept and production HPC environments, for example as the basis for workflows such as genomics portals that automate an entire DNA sequencing pipeline.
You can access AWS ParallelCluster via its command-line interface, its API, a Python library, a graphical web UI (PCUI), or as an AWS CloudFormation custom resource. ParallelCluster gives researchers and engineering teams access to elastic compute capacity without operating their own HPC infrastructure.
Core Features
- Automated cluster deployment: Complete setup of an HPC environment including compute nodes, scheduler, and shared storage.
- Auto-scaling: Compute nodes scale automatically based on the job queue.
- Slurm and AWS Batch integration: Choose between the established Slurm scheduler and AWS Batch depending on workload type.
- Shared storage: Integration with Amazon FSx for Lustre, Amazon EFS, and Amazon S3.
- Multiple access methods: CLI, API, Python library, web UI (PCUI), and CloudFormation integration.
Typical Use Cases
Scientific simulations: CFD simulations, molecular dynamics, weather models, and other compute-intensive scientific applications benefit from elastic, on-demand HPC capacity.
Machine learning training: Distributed training of ML models on GPU clusters, scaling from single GPUs to large multi-node clusters for foundation models.
Life sciences: Genomics pipelines, protein folding, and drug discovery with access to GPU-accelerated instances for compute-intensive analysis.
Benefits
- No hardware investment required for HPC projects.
- Elastic capacity that scales up and down on demand.
- Pay-per-use for the underlying AWS resources, combinable with Spot Instances for cost optimization.
- Familiar environment for HPC users through Slurm support.
Integration with innFactory
As an AWS Reseller, innFactory supports you with AWS ParallelCluster: we help with HPC cluster architecture, migration of on-premises HPC workloads, and optimization for cost and performance.
Typical Use Cases
Frequently Asked Questions
What is AWS ParallelCluster?
AWS ParallelCluster is an AWS-supported open-source tool for building and managing High Performance Computing clusters in the AWS Cloud. It automatically sets up the required compute resources, job scheduler, and a shared file system. You can access it via CLI, API, a Python library, a web UI (PCUI), or as a CloudFormation custom resource.
Which job schedulers are supported?
ParallelCluster supports Slurm and AWS Batch as job schedulers. Slurm is the more actively developed and widely used option for classic, tightly coupled HPC workloads, while AWS Batch suits container- and batch-oriented computing.
How much does AWS ParallelCluster cost?
The tool itself is free. You only pay for the AWS resources used when creating images and clusters, such as EC2 instances, EBS volumes, FSx or S3 storage, and network traffic. Spot Instances can significantly reduce compute costs.
Which instance types suit HPC workloads?
For tightly coupled HPC workloads, AWS offers dedicated HPC-optimized instance families such as Hpc7a (AMD-based) and Hpc7g (AWS Graviton-based) with optimized networking. For GPU-accelerated computing and ML training, families such as P5 and P6 are available. The right instance family depends on the workload and should be chosen based on current AWS documentation.
Note: All product information on this page has been compiled with care, but is provided without guarantee and may be outdated or incomplete. Cloud services evolve rapidly — features, pricing, SLAs, and availability change frequently. Authoritative and up-to-date information can only be found on the official product page of AWS (official documentation). This page does not represent an offer by AWS.