# Outdated provisioned IOPS volume type for high-I/O workloads Canonical: https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/outdated-provisioned-iops-volume-type-for-high-i-o-workloads Many environments continue using io1 volumes for high-performance workloads due to legacy provisioning or lack of awareness of io2 benefits. io2... By: Adam Richter Updated: 2026-09-28 [Cloud Efficiency Hub](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub) # Outdated Provisioned IOPS Volume Type for High-I/O Workloads The short version Many environments continue using io1 volumes for high-performance workloads due to legacy provisioning or lack of awareness of io2 benefits. io2 volumes provide equivalent or better performance and durability with reduced cost at scale. [Adam Richter](https://www.linkedin.com/in/adamjrichter/) Senior Optimization Solutions Architect @ Amazon Web Services (AWS) AWS service [AWS EBS](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/cloud-services/aws-ebs) Category [Storage](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/service-category/storage) Reference CER-0162 Type Outdated Version ## Explanation Why the waste happens and who it affects. Failing to adopt io2 where appropriate results in unnecessary spend on IOPS-heavy volumes. ## Billing model The pricing dimensions that drive this cost. Provisioned IOPS volumes are billed based on the amount of storage (per GB) and the number of provisioned IOPS. While io1 and io2 share the same baseline pricing, io2 introduces tiered IOPS pricing -offering a lower per-IOPS rate once volumes exceed thresholds such as 32,000 IOPS. For high-throughput workloads, this tiering makes io2 significantly more cost-effective. ## How to detect 5 checks to find it in your estate. - Review provisioned EBS volumes with the io1 volume type - Identify volumes provisioned with more than 32,000 IOPS - Confirm the workload requires sustained high IOPS - Estimate cost differences between io1 and io2 for similar configurations - Check for infrastructure-as-code templates still defaulting to io1 ## How to fix 4 ways to remove the waste. - Convert high-IOPS io1 volumes to io2 where supported - Update provisioning templates to default to io2 for performance-critical workloads - Validate application compatibility (typically no changes required) - Monitor cost and performance post-migration to confirm impact ## Documentation Vendor references for pricing and configuration. - [Amazon EBS volume types docs.aws.amazon.com](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/ebs/latest/userguide/ebs-volume-types.html) - [Amazon EBS Provisioned IOPS SSD volumes docs.aws.amazon.com](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/ebs/latest/userguide/provisioned-iops.html) - [Amazon EBS pricing aws.amazon.com](https://aws.amazon.com/ebs/pricing/) ## Related inefficiencies [Browse the library](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub) - AWS EBS CER-0079 ### [Outdated and Expensive EBS Volume Type](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/outdated-and-expensive-ebs-volume-type) Legacy volume types such as gp2 or io1 remain in use, even though AWS has released newer types - like gp3 and io2 - that offer better value: gp3 costs up to 20% less per GB than gp2, while io2 is priced the same as io1 for storage and for... Storage - AWS EBS CER-0154 ### [Delete-on-Termination Disabled for EBS Volume](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/delete-on-termination-disabled-for-ebs-volume) When EC2 instances are provisioned, each attached EBS volume has a \`DeleteOnTermination\` flag that determines whether it will be deleted when the instance is terminated. If this flag is set to \`false\` - often unintentionally in custom... Storage - AWS EBS CER-0178 ### [Overprovisioned EBS Volume](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/overprovisioned-ebs-volume) EBS volumes often remain significantly overprovisioned compared to the actual data stored on them. Because billing is based on the total provisioned capacity - not actual usage - this creates ongoing waste when large volumes are only... Storage --- Source: the public page above. Product screenshots and illustrative interfaces are examples, not live customer data.