Amazon EC2 Instance Stop Issues

Instance Stuck in Stopping State

Description: The EC2 instance remains in the "stopping" state for an extended period.

Cause:

• A process is preventing the OS from shutting down cleanly.
• The underlying host hardware has issues.
• A network or storage issue is preventing shutdown.

Solution:

• Try force-stopping the instance using:
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aws ec2 stop-instances --instance-ids i-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx --force

• If the issue persists, create an AWS Support ticket.

Instance Stops and Immediately Starts Again

Description: After stopping an instance, it automatically restarts.

Cause:

• An Auto Recovery feature is enabled on the instance.
• A startup script or process is forcing the instance to reboot.
• An AWS Auto Scaling group is automatically replacing stopped instances.

Solution:

• Check if the instance is part of an Auto Scaling group:
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aws autoscaling describe-auto-scaling-instances --instance-ids i-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

• Disable the Auto Recovery feature in the AWS Management Console.
• Check system logs for unexpected restart triggers.

Insufficient Permissions to Stop Instance

Description: You receive an error indicating that you lack permissions to stop the instance.

Cause: The IAM user or role does not have the required permissions.

Solution:

• Ensure that your IAM policy includes:
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{
  "Effect": "Allow",
  "Action": "ec2:StopInstances",
  "Resource": "arn:aws:ec2:region:account-id:instance/i-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"
}

• Contact the AWS administrator to grant necessary permissions.

Instance Remains in Pending State When Stopping

Description: The instance is stuck in a "pending" state and does not stop.

Cause: There may be an issue with AWS infrastructure or instance hardware.

Solution:

• Wait for a few minutes and try stopping the instance again.
• If the problem persists, try force-stopping:
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aws ec2 stop-instances --instance-ids i-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx --force

• Check AWS Service Health Dashboard for ongoing issues.

Volume Stuck in "In-Use" State

Description: The instance fails to stop because a volume remains in "in-use" state.

Cause:

• A process on the instance is still accessing the volume.
• The volume is attached to another instance.

Solution:

• Detach the volume manually:
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aws ec2 detach-volume --volume-id vol-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

• Ensure no active processes are using the volume before stopping the instance.

Instance Stops but Billing Continues

Description: The instance is stopped, but charges still appear on the bill.

Cause:

• Elastic IPs attached to the stopped instance incur charges.
• Attached EBS volumes still generate storage costs.

Solution:

• Release any unused Elastic IPs:
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aws ec2 release-address --allocation-id eipalloc-xxxxxxxx

• Delete unused EBS volumes to avoid unnecessary charges.