AWS Snow Family — Overview

1. What is the Snow Family?

Physical devices AWS ships to your location to transfer massive amounts of data into/out of AWS offline — bypassing the internet entirely — and to run compute at the edge in disconnected environments.

When to use Snow instead of internet upload:
  Rule of thumb: if uploading over your internet connection
  would take > 1 week → use a Snow device instead

  Example: 100 TB data @ 1 Gbps connection
    Upload time = 100 TB ÷ 1 Gbps = ~9 days → use Snowball
    Snowball: ship device → load data → ship back → ingested in ~1 week

2. Current Snow Family (as of Nov 2024) ⭐

AWS now offers only one active device family: Snowball Edge in two variants. Snowcone and Snowmobile have been phased out for new customers.

Device Storage Compute Use Case
Snowball Edge Storage Optimized 210 TB NVMe SSD 104 vCPU, 416 GB RAM Large-scale data migration
Snowball Edge Compute Optimized 28 TB NVMe SSD 104 vCPU, 416 GB RAM Edge compute workloads

Previous generation (discontinued Nov 12, 2024): Snowball Edge Storage Optimized 80TB, Compute Optimized 52 vCPU, and Compute Optimized with GPU — all retired.

3. Snowball Edge Features

Both variants include:
  S3-compatible API: apps use standard S3 SDK to read/write locally
  EC2-compatible compute: run AMIs locally on the device
  AWS IoT Greengrass: run Lambda functions at the edge
  Encryption: 256-bit encryption, AWS KMS key management
  Tamper-evident: ruggedized, shockproof, weather-resistant casing
  Transfer speed: up to 1.5 GB/s (Storage Optimized 210TB) [aws.amazon](https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/storage/aws-snow-device-updates/)
  Clustering: up to 15 devices clustered → petabyte-scale local storage

Storage Optimized (210 TB): best for bulk data migration
Compute Optimized (28 TB): best for ML inference, video processing,
                            IoT analytics in disconnected environments

4. Phased-Out Devices (Exam Awareness)

Snowcone (phased out for new customers):
  Was: smallest Snow device (4.5 lbs), 8 TB HDD or 14 TB SSD
  Could transfer via DataSync over internet OR ship back to AWS
  Now: use Snowball Edge instead

Snowmobile (phased out for new customers):
  Was: a 45-foot shipping container truck
  Capacity: up to 100 PB per trip
  Use was: exabyte-scale data center migrations
  Now: large customers contact AWS directly for alternatives

Exam note: Older certifications (SAA-C02, CLF-C01) may still reference Snowcone and Snowmobile specs — know them for legacy exam questions. Current real-world: Snowball Edge is the active product.

5. Common Use Cases

Data migration:          decommission on-prem data center → ship data to AWS S3/Glacier
Disaster recovery:       periodic full backup shipped to AWS
Edge computing:          oil rigs, military bases, ships, factories with no internet
IoT data collection:     gather sensor data in remote locations → ship to AWS for analysis
Content distribution:    pre-load media content onto device → ship to remote location

6. How the Ordering Process Works

1. Order device via AWS console (Snow Family → Create Job)
2. AWS ships Snowball Edge to your location (~4–6 business days)
3. Connect to your network → install Snowball client
4. Transfer data to device (S3-compatible local endpoint)
5. Ship device back to AWS (prepaid shipping label included)
6. AWS ingests data into your specified S3 bucket
7. AWS wipes device securely (NIST 800-88 compliant erasure)

7. Key Exam Points

  • Snow Family purpose: offline data transfer + edge compute — NOT internet-based
  • Active devices: Snowball Edge Storage Optimized (210 TB) and Compute Optimized (28 TB)
  • Snowcone + Snowmobile: phased out for new customers as of 2024
  • Data upload to S3 uses S3-compatible local API on the device
  • Encryption: always 256-bit + KMS — data encrypted before leaving your facility
  • AWS wipes device after ingestion (NIST 800-88)
  • Rule of thumb: > 1 week upload time via internet → use Snowball
  • Clustering: up to 15 Snowball Edge devices together for petabyte-scale