Introduction.
AWS CloudWatch and Simple Notification Service (SNS) are powerful tools that help organizations monitor, manage, and automate their cloud infrastructure effectively. In today’s fast-paced cloud environment, ensuring the health and performance of your resources is paramount. CloudWatch provides a comprehensive monitoring service for AWS resources and applications, collecting data in the form of metrics, logs, and events. This data can be used to generate real-time insights and alerts, giving system administrators the ability to take action promptly when issues arise.
However, simply monitoring metrics isn’t enough. You need a reliable way to respond to these insights and take corrective actions automatically or notify the right teams when something goes wrong. This is where AWS SNS comes into play. SNS is a fully managed messaging service that facilitates sending notifications to users or systems in various formats, such as email, SMS, HTTP requests, or even Lambda functions. Together, CloudWatch and SNS enable proactive monitoring and alerting in a seamless manner.
The integration of CloudWatch and SNS allows you to set up alarms based on specific metrics, like CPU utilization, memory usage, or disk space, and then trigger SNS notifications when those alarms are breached. For example, if an EC2 instance exceeds a defined CPU threshold, an SNS notification can be sent to the system administrator’s email, prompting immediate investigation and action.
This combination ensures that cloud infrastructures remain healthy and performant, helping organizations avoid downtime and maintain optimal user experiences. In this post, we’ll explore how to set up CloudWatch alarms, link them to SNS notifications, and take full advantage of these AWS services for better infrastructure management.
Through practical examples, we’ll walk you through the entire process of configuring CloudWatch to monitor your AWS resources and triggering SNS alerts, automating workflows and enabling timely responses to any issues that may arise. Whether you’re a cloud administrator, developer, or DevOps engineer, understanding how to leverage CloudWatch and SNS together is an essential skill for maintaining a high-performance AWS environment.
Furthermore, CloudWatch and SNS are not limited to simple alerts. They can be part of an intricate, automated system to trigger Lambda functions, invoke EC2 auto-scaling policies, or even deploy new application configurations in response to monitoring data. These tools help streamline operations and are crucial for modern cloud-native applications, especially as systems grow more complex and distributed.
By automating these processes, AWS helps reduce human error, increases operational efficiency, and ultimately allows teams to focus on delivering better products and services. If you’re looking to enhance your AWS cloud infrastructure, mastering the integration between CloudWatch and SNS is a great starting point.
STEP 1: Create a EC2 instance.

STEP 2: Navigate the SNS and Enter the topic name and click on next step.

STEP 3: Select the type and enter the display the name.
- Click on create.

STEP 4: Next, Create Subscrition.


STEP 5: Select message type Email and enter your email ID.
- Click on create.



STEP 6: Status is pending, So go to your mail confirm your message.




STEP 7: Now, Verify your status is Confirm.

STEP 8: Go to cloudwatch and Select the In alarm under alarm.
- Click on create alarm.

STEP 9: Select EC2 instance and Click on pre-Instance metrics.


STEP 10: Select CPU Utilization and click on select metrics.
- Review and click on create.



STEP 10: Select the following Options.
- Action : Instance Terminate.


STEP 11: Click on next and click on create alarm.


STEP 12: Your created alarm will be take to 2-3 mins for action.
- After go to the instance and verify the Instance terminated.


STEP 13: Send to alert notification for your Email.


Conclusion.
In conclusion, AWS CloudWatch and Simple Notification Service (SNS) provide an essential framework for effective cloud resource monitoring and alerting. CloudWatch offers deep insights into the performance and health of your AWS infrastructure, while SNS ensures that you can quickly respond to critical events through automated notifications. By integrating these two services, organizations can achieve proactive monitoring, minimize downtime, and improve overall system reliability.
The ability to create custom alarms based on specific metrics and trigger notifications ensures that your team stays informed in real time, making it easier to address issues before they impact users. Whether it’s scaling resources, triggering automated workflows, or simply sending alerts to team members, the CloudWatch-SNS combination serves as a powerful tool in any AWS-based environment.
As cloud infrastructure grows in complexity, leveraging automation with CloudWatch and SNS becomes not just a convenience, but a necessity. By incorporating these services into your cloud management practices, you can enhance your operational efficiency, reduce manual intervention, and ensure that your systems remain healthy and performant. Understanding how to configure, manage, and respond to alerts with CloudWatch and SNS is a valuable skill for anyone working with AWS, providing both the reliability and agility needed for modern cloud operations.