Containers and Kubernetes have become central to today's cloud-native world. Due to their complexity, many teams rely on managed services rather than building from scratch. On AWS, Amazon EKS provides a managed Kubernetes environment that reduces operational overhead while preserving full Kubernetes compatibility.
In this blog we will examine how EKS manages the control plane, how the worker nodes (data plane) function, and how the integrations with AWS services connect everything. We aim to help you understand what happens under the hood, giving you a solid foundation for EKS in your DevOps or cloud-ops work.
What is Amazon EKS?
Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (EKS) provides a fully managed Kubernetes service that eliminates the complexity of operating Kubernetes clusters. With EKS, you can:
- Deploy applications faster with less operational overhead
- Scale seamlessly to meet changing workload demands
- Improve security through AWS integration and automated updates
- Choose between standard EKS or fully automated EKS Auto Mode
Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (Amazon EKS) is the premiere platform for running Kubernetes clusters, both in the Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud and in your own data centers (EKS Anywhere and Amazon EKS Hybrid Nodes).
Amazon EKS simplifies building, securing, and maintaining Kubernetes clusters. It can be more cost effective at providing enough resources to meet peak demand than maintaining your own data centers. Two of the main approaches to using Amazon EKS are as follows:
EKS standard: AWS manages the Kubernetes control plane when you create a cluster with EKS. Components that manage nodes, schedule workloads, integrate with the AWS cloud, and store and scale control plane information to keep your clusters up and running, are handled for you automatically.
EKS Auto Mode: Using the EKS Auto Mode feature, EKS extends its control to manage Nodes (Kubernetes data plane) as well. It simplifies Kubernetes management by automatically provisioning infrastructure, selecting optimal compute instances, dynamically scaling resources, continuously optimizing costs, patching operating systems, and integrating with AWS security services.
The following diagram illustrates how Amazon EKS integrates your Kubernetes clusters with the AWS cloud, depending on which method of cluster creation you choose:
Features of Amazon EKS:
Amazon EKS provides the following high-level features:
Management interfaces:
EKS offers multiple interfaces to provision, manage, and maintain clusters, including AWS Management Console, Amazon EKS API/SDKs, CDK, AWS CLI, eksctl CLI, AWS CloudFormation, and Terraform. For more information, see Get started with Amazon EKS and Amazon EKS cluster lifecycle and configuration.
Access control tools:
EKS relies on both Kubernetes and AWS Identity and Access Management (AWS IAM) features to manage access from users and workloads. For more information, see Grant IAM users and roles access to Kubernetes APIs and Grant Kubernetes workloads access to AWS using Kubernetes Service Accounts.
Compute resources:
For compute resources, EKS allows the full range of Amazon EC2 instance types and AWS innovations such as Nitro and Graviton with Amazon EKS for you to optimize the compute for your workloads. For more information, see Manage compute resources by using nodes.
Storage:
EKS Auto Mode automatically creates storage classes using EBS volumes. Using Container Storage Interface (CSI) drivers, you can also use Amazon S3, Amazon EFS, Amazon FSX, and Amazon File Cache for your application storage needs. For more information, see Use application data storage for your cluster.
Security:
The shared responsibility model is employed as it relates to Security in Amazon EKS. For more information, see Security best practices, Infrastructure security, and Kubernetes security.
Monitoring tools:
Use the observability dashboard to monitor Amazon EKS clusters. Monitoring tools include Prometheus, CloudWatch, Cloudtrail, and ADOT Operator. For more information on dashboards, metrics servers, and other tools, see EKS cluster costs and Kubernetes Metrics Server.
Kubernetes compatibility and support:
Amazon EKS is certified Kubernetes-conformant, so you can deploy Kubernetes-compatible applications without refactoring and use Kubernetes community tooling and plugins. EKS offers both standard support and extended support for Kubernetes. For more information, see Understand the Kubernetes version lifecycle on EKS.
Related Services to use with Amazon EKS
You can use other AWS services with the clusters that you deploy using Amazon EKS:
Amazon EC2:
Obtain on-demand, scalable compute capacity with Amazon EC2.
Amazon EBS:
Attach scalable, high-performance block storage resources with Amazon EBS.
Amazon ECR:
Store container images securely with Amazon ECR.
Amazon CloudWatch:
Monitor AWS resources and applications in real time with Amazon CloudWatch.
Amazon Prometheus:
Track metrics for containerized applications with Amazon Managed Service for Prometheus.
Elastic Load Balancing:
Distribute incoming traffic across multiple targets with Elastic Load Balancing.
Amazon GuardDuty:
Detect threats to EKS clusters with Amazon GuardDuty.
AWS Resilience Hub:
Assess EKS cluster resiliency with AWS Resilience Hub.
Amazon EKS architecture:
Control plane:
Amazon EKS ensures every cluster has its own unique Kubernetes control plane. This design keeps each cluster’s infrastructure separate, with no overlaps between clusters or AWS accounts. The setup includes:
Distributed components
The control plane positions at least two API server instances and three etcd instances across three AWS Availability Zones within an AWS Region.
Optimal performance
Amazon EKS actively monitors and adjusts control plane instances to maintain peak performance.
Resilience
If a control plane instance falters, Amazon EKS quickly replaces it, using different Availability Zone if needed.
Consistent uptime
By running clusters across multiple Availability Zones, a reliable API server endpoint availability Service Level Agreement (SLA) is achieved.
Amazon EKS uses Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (Amazon VPC) to limit traffic between control plane components within a single cluster. Cluster components can’t view or receive communication from other clusters or AWS accounts, except when authorized by Kubernetes role-based access control (RBAC) policies.
Compute:
In addition to the control plane, an Amazon EKS cluster has a set of worker machines called nodes. Selecting the appropriate Amazon EKS cluster node type is crucial for meeting your specific requirements and optimizing resource utilization. Amazon EKS offers the following primary node types:
EKS Auto Mode:
EKS Auto Mode extends AWS management beyond the control plane to include the data plane, automating cluster infrastructure management. It integrates core Kubernetes capabilities as built-in components, including compute autoscaling, networking, load balancing, DNS, storage, and GPU support. EKS Auto Mode dynamically manages nodes based on workload demands, using immutable AMIs with enhanced security features. It automates updates and upgrades while respecting Pod Disruption Budgets, and includes managed components that would otherwise require add-on management. This option is ideal for users who want to leverage AWS expertise for day-to-day operations, minimize operational overhead, and focus on application development rather than infrastructure management.
AWS Fargate:
Fargate is a serverless compute engine for containers that eliminates the need to manage the underlying instances. With Fargate, you specify your application’s resource needs, and AWS automatically provisions, scales, and maintains the infrastructure. This option is ideal for users who prioritize ease-of-use and want to concentrate on application development and deployment rather than managing infrastructure.
Karpenter:
Karpenter is a flexible, high-performance Kubernetes cluster autoscaler that helps improve application availability and cluster efficiency. Karpenter launches right-sized compute resources in response to changing application load. This option can provision just-in-time compute resources that meet the requirements of your workload.
Managed node groups:
Managed node groups are a blend of automation and customization for managing a collection of Amazon EC2 instances within an Amazon EKS cluster. AWS takes care of tasks like patching, updating, and scaling nodes, easing operational aspects. In parallel, custom kubelet arguments are supported, opening up possibilities for advanced CPU and memory management policies. Moreover, they enhance security via AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) roles for service accounts, while curbing the need for separate permissions per cluster.
Self-managed nodes:
Self-managed nodes offer full control over your Amazon EC2 instances within an Amazon EKS cluster. You are in charge of managing, scaling, and maintaining the nodes, giving you total control over the underlying infrastructure. This option is suitable for users who need granular control and customization of their nodes and are ready to invest time in managing and maintaining their infrastructure.
Amazon EKS Hybrid Nodes:
With Amazon EKS Hybrid Nodes, you can use your on-premises and edge infrastructure as nodes in Amazon EKS clusters. Amazon EKS Hybrid Nodes unifies Kubernetes management across environments and offloads Kubernetes control plane management to AWS for your on-premises and edge applications.
Conclusion:
Amazon EKS brings together the best of Kubernetes and AWS — offering the flexibility of open-source container orchestration with the reliability, scalability, and security of a managed cloud platform. By abstracting the complexity of managing the control plane, networking, and scaling, EKS enables DevOps teams to focus more on delivering applications rather than maintaining infrastructure.
Whether you use EKS Auto Mode for full automation, Fargate for serverless container execution, or managed node groups for customizable compute control, EKS adapts to diverse operational models and workloads. Its deep integration with AWS services such as IAM, CloudWatch, ECR, and GuardDuty ensures a consistent and secure environment across every layer of deployment.
In essence, EKS is not just “Kubernetes on AWS” — it’s a bridge between containerized innovation and cloud-native efficiency. Understanding how EKS manages the control plane, worker nodes, and ecosystem integrations equips DevOps engineers to design robust, scalable, and production-ready container platforms.
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