Amazon Elastic VMware Service (Amazon EVS) is the recently launched AWS service that helps users to operate VMware workloads natively on AWS. And by using Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP (FSx for ONTAP) as an external datastore, you can decouple the VMware workload storage from compute. This opens the door to cost optimization strategies that aren’t possible in vSAN-only VMware deployments.
To evaluate the cost impact of using FSx for ONTAP with Amazon EVS, NetApp® Workload Factory now offers an Amazon EVS total cost of ownership (TCO) calculator. With it, you can compare two storage approaches for Amazon EVS—scaling with vSAN or extending capacity with FSx for ONTAP—so you can see the cost and savings estimates for your deployment.
In this post, you’ll discover how FSx for ONTAP reduces Amazon EVS costs and how to use the TCO calculator.
- The hyperconverged cost challenge: Buying more compute just to scale up storage
- How FSx for ONTAP reduces TCO on Amazon EVS
- Estimate your deployment costs and potential savings with the Workload Factory VMware TCO calculator
- How to Use the Workload Factory VMware TCO calculator
- Get started with FSx for ONTAP and Amazon EVS
The hyperconverged cost challenge: Buying more compute just to scale up storage
Amazon EVS brings your VMware deployment to AWS with no refactoring and no retraining, making VMware relocation fast, secure, and much more cost-effective.
Out of the box, Amazon EVS uses vSAN storage virtualization technology to pool storage in a single vSAN datastore across Elastic Sky X Integrated (ESXi) hosts. That means your total storage capacity is determined by the number of compute hosts running. If you outgrow your storage footprint, you can’t just add new disks—you also have to add more compute. That means more vCPUs and memory, whether you need them or not, and that’s a major cost concern.
Consider this: To support 180 TiB of usable storage with vSAN alone, you might need to provision three additional ESXi hosts. Those three extra hosts could add more than $25,000 in monthly compute costs, even if the workloads don’t require that extra compute power.
The outcome? Oversized clusters, inflated costs, and underutilized resources—especially for storage-intensive workloads.
How FSx for ONTAP reduces TCO on Amazon EVS
FSx for ONTAP is an AWS-native, fully managed storage service that delivers the same trusted NetApp ONTAP® data management capabilities many enterprises use on premises.
As an external datastore for Amazon EVS, it extends enterprise-grade NetApp storage capabilities to VMware on AWS, providing flexibility and efficiency beyond what vSAN-only designs offer.
Here’s how FSx for ONTAP lowers TCO in Amazon EVS:
- Decoupled storage and compute
In an Amazon EVS deployment, FSx for ONTAP acts as a separate, remote, shared storage server. The Amazon EVS ESXi compute nodes can access FSx for ONTAP as an external, network-attached datastore. And since FSx for ONTAP is independent storage, it can scale up on demand without adding compute. Learn how FSx for ONTAP decouples storage from compute and reduces TCO.
- Storage efficiency features and data tiering
FSx for ONTAP delivers enterprise-class storage efficiency for Amazon EVS workloads through built-in thin-provisioning, data compression, deduplication, and compaction. To further optimize costs, the data tiering feature automatically tiers infrequently used data to low-cost storage until the data needs access again.
- Data mobility
Replicating VMware data involves complex, time-intensive processes. FSx for ONTAP simplifies this with NetApp SnapMirror®, which transfers only incremental changes after the initial data sync. The result is faster, less costly data mobility with reduced downtime and development expenses. This is relevant for use cases such as data migration, hybrid environment management, and syncing disaster recovery copies.
- License cost savings
Using FSx for ONTAP as external storage reduces the number of compute hosts in use, enabling customers to need fewer core-based licenses.
Together, these capabilities deliver significant cost optimization, with TCO up to 50% lower than vSAN-only scaling.
For more on the benefits of using FSx for ONTAP with Amazon EVS, read Using Amazon EVS with FSx for ONTAP to optimize costs and performance. Next, we’ll look at the VMware workload TCO calculator in Workload Factory, which will show the details of the cost comparison.
Estimate your deployment costs and potential savings with the Workload Factory VMware TCO calculator
Workload Factory is a free service that helps you model, assess, and optimize your cloud infrastructure strategies that use FSx for ONTAP to meet specific workload requirements and align with NetApp and AWS well-architected storage framework best practices.
A key feature is the VMware TCO calculator, built specifically for evaluating storage choices in Amazon EVS. This tool goes beyond cost estimates and cost comparisons: It acts as a decision-making aid for anyone considering relocating VMware to Amazon EVS.
With it, you can compare the cost impact of running Amazon EVS with vSAN only versus extending storage with FSx for ONTAP. Instead of relying on spreadsheets or assumptions, the calculator delivers clear insights that support confident decision-making:
- Infrastructure architects can compare Amazon EVS with other VMware cloud options to see the potential costs and savings of their designs.
- IT managers can justify Amazon EVS proposals with verifiable numbers.
- Cloud planners can identify cost-saving opportunities driven by inefficiencies (such as overprovisioning) and observe the effects of applying best practices.
Use it before migration, during rightsizing and cluster balancing, or as an ongoing checkpoint for audits and strategy reviews.
How to Use the Workload Factory VMware TCO calculator
With the Workload Factory VMware TCO calculator, you can model Amazon EVS cluster requirements, compare scaling with vSAN versus FSx for ONTAP, and export a detailed report with savings projections. Clear visuals and documented assumptions highlight exactly where the savings were made. Let's walk through how to use the calculator.
Step 1: Open the calculator in Workload Factory
From the Workload Factory home page, go to the VMware workload card and select Explore savings.
This opens the Amazon EVS TCO calculator view.
Step 2: Define your VMWare workload requirements
The first step is to describe your environment.
As an example, let’s say we want our high-availability pair of i4i.metal instances to include 160 TiB of storage. But, this compute configuration for Amazon EVS comes with up to 60 TB of local AWS Nitro SSD storage only. That gap forces you to either add extra compute with vSAN or extend capacity with FSx for ONTAP.
In the TCO calculator, we can use the sliders in the left panel to specify the required physical CPU count, physical memory in GiB, and VM storage in TiB. Additionally, you can change your Amazon EVS billing plan from on-demand to 1-year or 3-year reservations if acquired for your deployment.
By default, the calculator assumes standard ONTAP storage efficiencies (single-AZ deployment, SSD storage only, first-generation filesystem type, scale-up model), shared tenancy pricing, and deployment in the us-east-1 region.
Step 3: Review your cost comparison output
Once the requirements are set, the right-hand panel comes alive. It shows side-by-side costs for two scenarios: Scaling Amazon EVS with vSAN or with FSx for ONTAP.
In this case, FSx for ONTAP delivers 49% monthly savings—about $42,938 compared with vSAN-only scaling—on-demand.
Scrolling down, the calculator also provides a detailed breakdown of FSx for ONTAP external storage specifications and TCO estimates—including host counts, storage efficiency savings, and estimated monthly costs. These details help you understand not only how much you can save, but also where the savings come from.
Please note that VMware Cloud Foundation licensing costs are not included. The additional cost savings FSx for ONTAP provides by requiring fewer core-based licenses are also not shown in the calculator.
Step 4: Export the final report
You can adjust the inputs multiple times to reflect your workload mix—for example, a storage-heavy VDI deployment or a compute-balanced production cluster. Every change updates the savings model instantly.
When you are ready, you can print the report for your team from your browser or select Contact an expert by email for tailored guidance.
Workload Factory also guides you to the next step: Plan EVS Migration, which helps execute your design with automation and best practices.
You can learn more about how to use the migration advisor from Expedite VMware workload relocations with Workload Factory Migration Advisor.
Get started with FSx for ONTAP and Amazon EVS
The VMware TCO calculator is more than a cost estimator; it’s a way to bring transparency to your Amazon EVS planning. By modeling storage and compute separately, you see exactly how FSx for ONTAP transforms VMware economics on Amazon EVS. No surprises, no hidden assumptions: just clear numbers you can use to guide decisions.
Whether you’re exploring Amazon EVS for the first time or looking to optimize an existing cluster, the calculator gives you the insight to act with confidence. And with the Workload Factory migration advisor, you can go beyond modeling: design your migration, generate infrastructure-as-code, and move forward with a well-architected deployment.
Watch this video on how to estimate your cost savings on Amazon EVS with FSx for ONTAP and Workload Factory, or get started with the cost calculator today.
