Creating instance groups

Create an instance group using the Instance Groups component in the Yandex.Cloud management console.

Before you start

1. Log in to or register in the management console. If you aren't registered, go to the management console and follow the instructions.
2. On the billing page, make sure you linked a payment account, and it has the ACTIVE or TRIAL_ACTIVE status. If you don't have a billing account, create one.
3. If you don't have a folder, create one.

Creating an instance group

You can create an automatically scaled group or a group with a fixed number of instances. Learn more in Scaling types.

To create an instance group:

1. In the management console, select a folder to create your instance group in.

2. In the list of services, select Compute Cloud.

3. Go to the Instance groups tab.

4. Click Create group.

5. Under Basic parameters:

   • Enter a name and description of the instance group. Naming requirements:

     • Length — from 3 to 63 characters.
     • The name may contain lowercase Latin letters, numbers, and hyphens.
     • The first character must be a letter. The last character can't be a hyphen.

     Note

     The VM name is used to generate the FQDN only once, when creating the VM. If the FQDN is important to you, choose an appropriate name for the VM at the creation stage.

   • Select a service account from the list or create a new one. To be able to create, update, and delete group instances, assign the editor role to the service account. All operations in Instance Groups are performed on behalf of the service account.

6. In the Allocation section, select the desired availability zones. Group instances may reside in different availability zones and regions. Learn more about Yandex.Cloud geography.

7. In the Instance template section, click Set to set the basic instance configuration:

   • Under Basic parameters:
     • Enter a description for the basic instance.
     • Select a service account from the list or create a new one.
   • Select a public image.
   • In the Disks section:
     • Select the disk type.
     • Specify the disk size.
     • (optional) Click Add disk to add more disks.
   • Under Computing resources:
     • Choose the platform.
     • Specify the guaranteed share and number of vCPUs and RAM you need.
     • (optional) Specify that the VM must be preemptible.
   • Under Network settings:
     • Select the cloud network and the subnet. If there is no network, create one:
       • Click Create new network.
       • Enter a name for the new network and choose the network to connect the instance group to.
       • Select a subnet or create a new one. Each network must have at least one subnet.
       • Click Create.
     • In the Public IP field, choose a method for assigning an IP address:
       • Auto: Assign a random IP address from the Yandex.Cloud IP pool.
       • No address: Don't assign a public IP address.
   • Under Access:
     • If you selected a Linux-based public image:
       • Enter the username in the Login field.
       • Under SSH key, paste the contents of the public key file. You have to create a key pair for SSH connections on your own.
     • If you selected a Windows-based public image:
       • In the Password field, set a password for the Administrator user. The Administrator user is created automatically.
     • Click Add.

8. Under Allow when creating and updating, specify:

   • The number of instances that can exceed the group size.

   • The number of instances the group size can be reduced by.

   • The number of instances that can be created simultaneously.

   • The number of instances that can be deleted simultaneously.

     For more information, see Deployment policy.

9. In the Scalability section:

   • Select the scaling type.
   • If you selected the Fixed type, specify the size of the group.
   • If you selected Automatic, specify:
     • The minimum number of instances per availability zone.
     • Maximum group size.
     • Utilization measurement period: The period for which utilization measurements should be averaged for each instance in the group.
     • Instance warmup period: The period during which the created instance is not taken into account when measuring the average load on the group.
     • Stabilization period: The interval during which the required number of instances in the group can't be reduced.
     • Initial group size: The number of instances created with the group.
     • Target CPU performance level. Set as a percentage.

10. Under Integration with Load Balancer:

    • (optional) Click the Create target group toggle. Target groups are necessary for the network load balancer to distribute loads.
      • Enter a name and description for the target group.

11. Under Health checks:

    • (optional) Click the Activate toggle.
      • Select the check type: HTTP or TCP.
      • Specify a port number from the range 1-32767.
      • If you chose the HTTP check, specify the URL to perform checks for.
      • Specify the response timeout in seconds.
      • Specify the interval, in seconds, for sending health check requests.
      • Set the healthy threshold, which is the number of successful checks required in order to consider the VM ready to receive traffic.
      • Set the unhealthy threshold, which is the number of failed checks after which no traffic will be routed to the VM.

12. Click Create.

The instance group appears in the list.

What's next

• Watch tutorials for creating web services in Yandex.Cloud.
• Learn how to work with instance groups.
• Read answers to frequently asked questions.