aws / aws/containers-roadmap

[EKS] [request]: Enable Detailed Monitoring on EKS Auto Nodes

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EKS EKS Auto Mode Proposed
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Description

### Community Note

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**Tell us about your request**
We'd like the ability to enable [CloudWatch Detailed Monitoring](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/using-cloudwatch-new.html) (1-minute metrics) on EC2 instances provisioned by EKS **Auto mode**.

**Which service(s) is this request for?**
EKS Auto Mode

**Tell us about the problem you're trying to solve. What are you trying to do, and why is it hard?**
We run EKS in shared accounts that also host traditional EC2 workloads. Our monitoring and compliance setup uses AWS Config to alert us when EC2 instances don’t have detailed monitoring enabled.

With EKS Auto mode, the EC2 nodes show up in the EC2 console like any other instance, so they trigger these alerts. However, unlike traditional EC2 instances, we have no way to enable detailed monitoring on them — either manually or through configuration.

This creates unnecessary noise in our alerting and breaks consistency in our observability standards. More importantly, it prevents us from collecting 1-minute CPU metrics that are essential for performance monitoring and debugging issues that might otherwise be missed at 5-minute resolution.

I believe the shared responsibility model doesn’t seem to apply cleanly here. In services like RDS, the underlying EC2 layer is abstracted entirely. But with Auto mode, the EC2 instances are fully visible in the account — so it’s surprising that basic EC2 features like detailed monitoring are locked down.

**Are you currently working around this issue?**
Previously, we used Karpenter, which allowed us to configure instances with detailed monitoring enabled. But after moving to Auto Mode, we haven't been able to find a workaround for this.

**Additional context**
N/A

**Attachments**
N/A

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

Research direction

No repository file, test, or entry point is identified; start by reading the EKS Auto Mode and CloudWatch Detailed Monitoring links in the issue. Confirm whether EKS Auto Mode can expose 1-minute EC2 metrics and define completion as supported configuration that enables detailed monitoring without the reported compliance alerts.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
aws, kubernetes
Domain
cloud, infrastructure, observability
Issue type
Feature
Difficulty
5/5
Estimated time
Over a week
Activity status
Quiet
Clarity
Clearly specified
Newbie friendliness
25/100

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