How to find an AMI in the new AWS console version?

Question

I am trying to create an instance in the Launch Configuration menu, but it is impossible to find the needed AMI from the dropdown.

• I expected following menu:

• But currently AWS provides the following possibilities ()selection from the dropdown:

• I can't find the needed AMI from the list (Linux for example) The bottom line is that I can't even use the search dropdown. It does not find existing AMI's:

It's confusing and I do not know how to use AWS now...

Answer 1

Ubuntu AMIs

Ubuntu maintains a page with the latest AMIs in each region for your convenience and reference.

Rocky Linux

Rocky Linux also maintains a handy page for finding AMIs in each region.

Amazon or other specific vendor AMIs

The AWS console can be rather limiting, but you can find the latest AMI with the awscli tool.

Get a list of Amazon images:

aws ec2 describe-images --owners amazon --filters "Name=name,Values=amzn*" --query 'sort_by(Images, &CreationDate)[].Name'

Use AWS Systems Manager paramater store to find the latest one with the name you want:

aws ssm get-parameters --names /aws/service/ami-amazon-linux-latest/amzn2-ami-hvm-x86_64-gp2 --region us-east-1 

Then make sure you always use the latest when launching an instance:

aws ec2 run-instances --image-id $(aws ssm get-parameters --names /aws/service/ami-amazon-linux-latest/amzn2-ami-hvm-x86_64-gp2 --query 'Parameters[0].[Value]' --output text) --count 1 --instance-type m4.large