Answer: Use Spot Instances in an Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (Amazon EKS) managed node group.

## Explanation **Correct Answer: B - Use Spot Instances in an Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (Amazon EKS) managed node group.** **Key Analysis:** 1. **Cost Minimization Requirement**: The company needs to minimize cost. Spot Instances provide up to 90% discount compared to On-Demand Instances, making them the most cost-effective option. 2. **Stateless & Disruption-Tolerant Applications**: The applications are stateless and can tolerate disruptions. This is a perfect use case for Spot Instances, which can be interrupted with a 2-minute warning when AWS needs the capacity back. 3. **Operational Overhead Minimization**: The company wants to minimize operational overhead. Amazon EKS managed node groups handle: - Node provisioning and lifecycle management - Automatic node replacement if Spot Instances are interrupted - Automatic patching and updates - Integration with AWS services 4. **Why not Option A (Spot Instances in EC2 Auto Scaling group)**: - While Spot Instances are cost-effective, managing container orchestration on EC2 instances requires more operational overhead - You would need to manage container scheduling, scaling, and orchestration yourself - No built-in handling of Spot interruptions for containers 5. **Why not Options C & D (On-Demand Instances)**: - On-Demand Instances are significantly more expensive than Spot Instances - They don't align with the cost minimization requirement 6. **EKS Managed Node Groups with Spot Instances Benefits**: - **Cost Optimization**: Spot Instances provide maximum cost savings - **Reduced Operational Overhead**: EKS manages the Kubernetes control plane, and managed node groups handle node lifecycle - **Automatic Recovery**: When Spot Instances are interrupted, EKS managed node groups automatically replace them - **Container Orchestration**: Built-in support for container deployment and management **Best Practice**: For stateless, disruption-tolerant containerized applications where cost is a primary concern, using Spot Instances with EKS managed node groups provides the optimal balance of cost savings and reduced operational overhead.

Author: LeetQuiz Editorial Team