Understanding AWS Global Infrastructure

Key Components

• Regions — separate geographic areas (e.g. Mumbai, Singapore, Virginia) containing multiple isolated data centers.
• Availability Zones (AZs) — one or more discrete data centers within a Region, each with independent power, cooling, and networking.
• Edge Locations — sites used by CloudFront and Route 53 to cache content closer to end users for lower latency.
• Local Zones — infrastructure placed closer to large population centers for ultra-low-latency applications.

Why This Matters

Designing applications across multiple Availability Zones improves fault tolerance, while choosing the right Region reduces latency for your users and helps meet data residency requirements.

Example

The Asia Pacific (Mumbai) Region contains multiple Availability Zones, letting you deploy redundant infrastructure within India while keeping data local for compliance.