What is the primary function of an Amazon Machine Image (AMI)?

The primary function of an Amazon Machine Image (AMI) is to contain configuration settings, the operating system, software, and any associated data required to launch Amazon EC2 instances. An AMI acts as a template that defines the software stack and configurations needed to run your application. When you launch an EC2 instance, you select an AMI, which ensures that your instance is set up with all components that are necessary for your workloads right from the start. This makes it easy to scale applications and create multiple instances with consistent configurations.

In contrast, temporary block storage for EC2 instances is handled by instance store volumes or Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS), which is separate from the AMI's function. High availability of EC2 instances is achieved using Auto Scaling and Elastic Load Balancing, not through AMIs directly. Similarly, distributing incoming application traffic across targets is a feature of the Elastic Load Balancing service and is not related to the purpose of an AMI.