AWS Region Selection for European Workloads

Quick Tip: Choosing AWS Regions in Europe

When deploying workloads in AWS for European customers, region selection directly impacts compliance, performance, and costs.

European AWS Regions

AWS currently offers these European regions:

Region Code	Location	GDPR Compliant	Notes
eu-west-1	Ireland	✅	Most established EU region
eu-west-2	London	✅	Post-Brexit considerations
eu-west-3	Paris	✅	French data sovereignty
eu-central-1	Frankfurt	✅	German data residency
eu-central-2	Zurich	✅	Swiss privacy laws
eu-north-1	Stockholm	✅	Powered by renewable energy
eu-south-1	Milan	✅	Italian market focus
eu-south-2	Spain	✅	Newest EU region

Decision Framework

interface WorkloadRequirements {
  dataResidency: 'strict' | 'flexible';
  primaryMarket: string;
  latencyTarget: number; // in ms
  complianceFramework: string[];
}

function selectRegion(req: WorkloadRequirements): string {
  // Strict residency? Match country if possible
  if (req.dataResidency === 'strict') {
    const countryRegions = {
      'DE': 'eu-central-1',
      'FR': 'eu-west-3',
      'IT': 'eu-south-1',
      'CH': 'eu-central-2'
    };
    return countryRegions[req.primaryMarket] || 'eu-west-1';
  }

  // Otherwise, optimize for latency and service availability
  return 'eu-west-1'; // Most services available
}

Key Considerations

1. Data Residency Requirements

Some European countries require data to stay within national borders:

• France: Strict for public sector
• Germany: Financial services requirements
• Switzerland: Privacy laws favor local storage

2. Service Availability

Not all AWS services are available in all regions:

• eu-west-1 (Ireland): Most comprehensive service catalog
• Newer regions: May lack some services (check AWS Regional Services)

3. Latency

Test latency from your user base:

# Quick latency check to EU regions
for region in eu-west-1 eu-central-1 eu-west-3; do
  echo "Testing $region..."
  ping -c 5 dynamodb.$region.amazonaws.com
done

4. Costs

Pricing varies by region:

• eu-west-1: Generally lowest in EU
• eu-central-2 (Zurich): Premium pricing
• Data transfer: Same region = free

Pro Tips

1. Multi-Region for DR: Consider primary in eu-central-1, backup in eu-west-1
2. CloudFront + Origin Shield: Improve global performance while keeping data in EU
3. VPC Peering: Connect regions for multi-region architectures
4. Compliance Documentation: AWS provides region-specific compliance reports

Common Patterns

Strict Compliance + Performance:

Primary: eu-central-1 (Frankfurt)
Read Replicas: eu-west-1 (Ireland)
CloudFront: Global edge locations
Policy: Write operations stay in Frankfurt

Cost-Optimized:

Primary: eu-west-1 (Ireland)
Backup: eu-central-1 (Frankfurt)
Storage: S3 Intelligent-Tiering

Maximum Sovereignty:

Single region: eu-central-1 or eu-west-3
No cross-region replication
Encryption with customer-managed keys
IAM policies restrict region access

Enforce Region Restrictions

Use AWS Organizations SCPs to prevent accidental deployment outside EU:

{
  "Version": "2012-10-17",
  "Statement": [{
    "Effect": "Deny",
    "Action": "*",
    "Resource": "*",
    "Condition": {
      "StringNotEquals": {
        "aws:RequestedRegion": [
          "eu-west-1",
          "eu-west-2",
          "eu-west-3",
          "eu-central-1",
          "eu-central-2",
          "eu-north-1",
          "eu-south-1"
        ]
      }
    }
  }]
}

Conclusion

For most European workloads:

• General use: eu-west-1 (Ireland)
• German market: eu-central-1 (Frankfurt)
• French compliance: eu-west-3 (Paris)
• Strict sovereignty: Match your country’s region

Always verify your specific compliance requirements with legal counsel.