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Activate your AWS account

Ensuring your AWS Account is activated (please read)

The activation email looks like this (the content might be slightly different for you):

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Note: The text might be slightly different for you, but as long as AWS says thank you, or welcome, and tells you to start using your account, it should mean it's activated.

Example: A student received "Thank you for creating an Amazon Web Services (AWS) account. For the next 12 months, you will have free access to compute, storage, database, and application services. Learn more by visiting our Free Tier page. To access your account, click Access Account"


To have your account activated, make sure to:

Add a Payment Method

Verify your phone number

Choose an AWS Support Plan (Free)
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If your account is not activated yet, you will see this kind of error messages in the next lecture:

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1.How to get an account activation email? (can take up to 24 hours, usually few minutes)

After you choose a Support plan, a confirmation page indicates that your account is being activated. Accounts are usually activated within a few minutes, but the process might take up to 24 hours.

You can sign in to your AWS account during this time. The AWS home page might display a button that shows "Complete Sign Up" during this time, even if you've completed all the steps in the sign-up process.

When your account is fully activated, you'll receive a confirmation email. After you receive this email, you have full access to all AWS services.

2.Troubleshooting delays in account activation

Account activation can sometimes be delayed. If the process takes more than 24 hours, check the following:

  • Finish the account activation process. You might have accidentally closed the window for the sign-up process before you've added all the necessary information. To finish the sign-up process, open https://aws-portal.amazon.com/gp/aws/developer/registration/index.html and sign in using the email address and password you chose for the account.

  • Check the information associated with your payment method. Check Payment Methods in the AWS Billing and Cost Management console. Fix any errors in the information.

  • Contact your financial institution. Financial institutions occasionally reject authorization requests from AWS for various reasons. Contact your payment method's issuing institution and ask that they approve authorization requests from AWS.

** Note**: AWS cancels the authorization request as soon as it's approved by your financial institution. You aren't charged for authorization requests from AWS. Authorization requests might still appear as a small charge (usually 1 USD) on statements from your financial institution.

  • Check your email for requests for additional information. Check your email to see if AWS needs any information from you to complete the activation process.

  • Try a different browser.

  • Contact AWS Support. Contact AWS Support for help. Be sure to mention any troubleshooting steps that you already tried.
    Note: Don't provide sensitive information, such as credit card numbers, in any correspondence with AWS.

3.How to Contact AWS Support?

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The top right corner will have Support > Support Center.

Ask them to activate the account, that can take up to 24 hours

4.Where to find more details?

Details can be found here

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