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Runless vs. AWS Instance Scheduler

Two ways to stop paying for idle AWS resources outside business hours

Instance Scheduler on AWS is a free, official AWS Solutions Implementation: a CloudFormation stack plus a DynamoDB-backed scheduling engine that starts and stops EC2 instances (and RDS) based on tags. It's a solid choice if you're comfortable owning the deployment yourself. Runless is a hosted SaaS alternative - you connect an AWS account through a scoped cross-account role and manage schedules from a dashboard instead of tags and CloudFormation parameters.

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AWS Instance Scheduler

  • Free - no subscription cost, only the AWS resources it runs on
  • You deploy, upgrade and monitor the CloudFormation stack yourself
  • Tag-based scheduling: instances opt in via a tag value referencing a named schedule
  • No built-in dashboard - schedules are DynamoDB items, inspected via the console or CLI
  • No per-tenant team access model; access follows your existing IAM setup
  • ECS service scheduling is not in scope of the core solution

Runless

  • Paid SaaS ($49–$99/tenant/month) - no infrastructure to deploy or patch
  • Onboarding via a Quick Start stack; updates ship from the vendor side
  • Schedule and manually override ECS services and EC2 instances from a dashboard
  • Cost-savings tracking per resource, not just a schedule log
  • Tenant-level team management with owner/member roles
  • Covers ECS services and EC2 instances today, one control plane for both

When AWS Instance Scheduler is the better fit

If you already have infrastructure-as-code discipline, want zero recurring cost, and only need EC2 (or RDS) scheduling without a dashboard or team-access layer, the official solution is a reasonable choice - you own it outright and there's no vendor relationship to manage.

When Runless is the better fit

If you want ECS service scheduling alongside EC2, a dashboard your whole team can use without touching tags or CloudFormation, manual override for late-night deployments, and savings tracking out of the box, Runless trades a small monthly fee for not having to build and maintain that tooling yourself. See the FAQ for setup time and permissions, or start with Early Access.