Datadog · AWS monitoring
AWS monitoring in Saudi Arabia: EC2, EKS, Lambda and RDS in one Datadog view
AWS monitoring tells you whether the services your business runs on AWS are healthy, what they cost, and which change broke them. Datadog reads CloudWatch through its AWS integration and puts it next to host, container, trace and log data from the Datadog Agent, so EC2, EKS, ECS, Lambda, RDS and S3 can be read on one screen. Interkey sells Datadog licences in Saudi Arabia, connects your AWS accounts, tunes the dashboards and alerts, and provides technical support from Riyadh.
In short
- What it covers: EC2, EKS, ECS on Fargate, Lambda, RDS, S3 and the other AWS services you use.
- How data is collected: the AWS integration reads CloudWatch through a read-only IAM role; the Datadog Agent adds hosts, containers, traces and logs.
- Who it is for: cloud, platform and operations teams running production on AWS.
- How it is billed: per product unit (hosts, containers, functions, log volume); see our Datadog pricing guide.
- What Interkey does: licences, account connection, Agent roll-out, tagging, dashboards, alerts and technical support.
At a glance: what CloudWatch gives you and what Datadog adds
CloudWatch is AWS's own monitoring service. The question is rarely whether to replace it, but whether one team can read AWS services, the applications on them and the bill together.
| Area | Already in AWS (CloudWatch) | What Datadog adds |
|---|---|---|
| AWS service metrics | Metrics per service, account and Region | Metrics for more than 90 AWS services through one integration, beside every other source |
| Hosts and containers | Instance-level metrics | The Agent on EC2, EKS nodes and ECS tasks: processes and containers |
| Application traces | Set up separately per service | APM traces linked to the host, container or function that served the request |
| Logs | Log groups per service | Logs forwarded from CloudWatch or S3, next to metrics and traces |
| Cost | AWS billing and cost reports | Your Cost and Usage Report beside usage and performance |
| Alerts | Alarms per metric | Monitors on shared tags, routed to the owning team; CloudWatch alarms can arrive as events |
What AWS monitoring has to cover
A typical application on AWS has a load balancer, EC2 instances or an EKS cluster, a few Lambda functions, an RDS database and S3 buckets. When a customer reports a slow page, the team needs to know which layer is at fault, and AWS cloud monitoring only helps if the layers can be read together.
Good AWS monitoring tools therefore cover four things: the health of each AWS service, from CloudWatch; what runs inside instances and containers; the path of a request through the application; and cost, because on AWS a change in usage is a change in the bill. Datadog covers all four on one platform, tied together by the same tags.
How Datadog monitors each AWS service
Collection differs by service. Some data comes through the AWS integration and needs nothing installed; some needs the Agent or a Lambda extension.
| AWS service | How Datadog collects it | What you can see |
|---|---|---|
| Amazon EC2 | AWS integration for metrics and tags; the Agent on each instance | Instance health, processes, disks and services on the host |
| Amazon EKS | Kubernetes, AWS and EC2 integrations; the Agent on every node as a DaemonSet | Clusters, nodes, pods and containers, with logs and traces |
| Amazon ECS on AWS Fargate | The Agent as an extra container in each task definition | CPU, memory, network and I/O per task; logs through FireLens; traces with APM |
| AWS Lambda | The Datadog Lambda Extension with a runtime-specific library | Enhanced metrics for cold starts, timeouts, memory and estimated cost; logs; traces |
| Amazon RDS | CloudWatch metrics; Database Monitoring for query detail on supported engines | Instance health, and the queries behind a slow application |
| Amazon S3 | CloudWatch metrics and read-only resource collection; logs forwarded from buckets | Bucket metrics and configuration, and access logs where enabled |
Datadog states that the integration pulls new metrics every ten minutes on average, and that CloudWatch Metric Streams, set up separately through Amazon Data Firehose, bring that to two to three minutes. Our infrastructure monitoring page covers the Agent in depth.
EKS, ECS Fargate and Lambda monitoring: where most of the work is
EC2 and RDS metrics arrive once the integration is connected. Containers and serverless need more design.
EKS monitoring. The Agent runs on every node, and cluster metrics come through the Kubernetes integration. What matters is the tags each workload carries, which namespaces are collected, and how logs from short-lived pods are kept under control. Our Kubernetes monitoring design guide sets out Interkey's reference design.
Read more
ECS Fargate monitoring. There is no host, so the Agent runs as one more container in each task definition, a change made in your pipeline rather than by hand. Datadog describes the CloudWatch-based ECS metrics as less granular and delayed, which is why the change is worth it.
AWS Lambda monitoring. The Datadog Lambda Extension collects function logs through the Lambda Telemetry API, without passing through CloudWatch, and produces enhanced metrics at second-level granularity. The library adds traces, so a request can be followed from an API into a function and on to the database.
Where teams in Saudi Arabia use it
- A customer-facing application on EKS. One dashboard per service, so the team on call sees that service's pods, database and traces.
- An event-driven back end on Lambda. Cold starts, timeouts and errors per function, with traces showing which downstream call is slow.
- Several AWS accounts under one organisation. Datadog documents AWS Organizations multi-account set-up, so new accounts are connected the same way every time.
- An estate split between AWS and a local data centre. The Agent runs in both, so one view covers both.
- Investigating an incident. Logs forwarded from CloudWatch or S3, read next to metrics and traces from the same minute. Our Datadog log management page covers keeping log volume in budget.
RelatedDatadog log management page
AWS cost monitoring beside performance
On AWS, a scaling decision is also a spending decision. Datadog Cloud Cost Management reads the Cost and Usage Report you create in AWS Data Exports, which AWS delivers to an S3 bucket that Datadog is given read access to. Datadog says data can take 48 to 72 hours to appear once a complete report exists, and that up to 15 months of history in the bucket is ingested.
The value is cost next to usage: a cluster that doubled its nodes after a release, or a function whose cost rose with its duration. See our Datadog cloud cost management page.
The AWS Saudi Region, data residency and local support
AWS has announced its first infrastructure Region in the Kingdom and says it is on track to launch in December 2026. On 2 November 2026 it was not yet in AWS's list of available Regions; today's Middle East Regions are Bahrain and the UAE. Our AWS in Saudi Arabia page tracks that status. When the Saudi Region opens, the Datadog integration is set to read it like any other Region you use.
Read more
Monitoring data has its own location question. Datadog is SaaS, and as of November 2026 its documented sites are in the US, Germany, Japan, Australia and the UK, none in the Middle East. AWS metrics rarely hold personal data, but logs and tags can, so Interkey agrees with your security team what is collected and which fields are removed first. Support comes from Interkey's engineers in Riyadh, in Arabic and English.
RelatedAWS in Saudi Arabia page
How an AWS monitoring project runs with Interkey
-
Map the estate.
Accounts, Regions, and the AWS services each business application uses.
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Quote the licences.
The Datadog products you need, quoted with implementation and support.
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Connect the accounts.
A read-only IAM role per account, through CloudFormation or Terraform, reviewed by your security team.
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Roll out the Agent and Lambda extension.
EC2 and EKS first, then ECS tasks and Lambda functions, through your pipeline.
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Agree tags, then build.
One standard for service, environment, version and owner; then service dashboards and alerts.
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Review noise and cost.
Alert volume, log volume and AWS-side costs, after the first weeks in production.
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Operate or hand over.
Interkey operates the platform from Riyadh, or hands it over and stays on as technical support.
What drives the cost and the timeline
There are two bills to plan. Datadog's depends on the hosts, containers and Lambda functions monitored, the log data you index and keep, and the products you add; our Datadog pricing guide sets out how each is billed. On the AWS side, check AWS's own pricing for CloudWatch API requests, Metric Streams and Data Firehose, billed to your AWS account.
The timeline is an estimate, not a promise. Connecting accounts and getting AWS service metrics usually takes days; rolling the Agent across clusters, tasks and functions, and agreeing the tags, typically a few weeks. The drivers are the number of accounts, your deployment pipeline, and how quickly security reviews of the IAM role and network path are completed.
Questions buyers ask
Do we still need CloudWatch if Datadog monitors our AWS estate?
Yes. CloudWatch stays the source of AWS service metrics and many logs, and Datadog reads them through its AWS integration. What changes is where your team reads and alerts on them.
What access does Datadog need to our AWS accounts?
A read-only IAM role in each account, with a policy Datadog publishes. Resource collection also uses the AWS managed SecurityAudit policy. Your security team reviews both before anything is connected.
Can EKS, ECS Fargate and Lambda be monitored in the same view?
Yes. Each is collected differently: the Agent on EKS nodes, the Agent inside each ECS task, and the Lambda Extension for functions. With one tagging standard, they appear together per service.
Does our AWS monitoring data stay in Saudi Arabia?
Not with Datadog today. As of November 2026, Datadog lists no Middle East site. Interkey designs what is collected and which fields are removed, so personal data stays out of logs and tags.
How is Datadog for AWS licensed and paid for in KSA?
Interkey sells Datadog licences in Saudi Arabia and quotes them with implementation and support. Each product has its own billing unit; our Datadog pricing guide has the list prices.
How long does it take to set up AWS monitoring?
AWS service metrics usually arrive within days of connecting an account. Agent roll-out across clusters, tasks and functions typically takes a few weeks, depending on accounts, pipelines and security reviews.
Next
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Next step
Connect your AWS accounts to Datadog
Tell us how many AWS accounts you run, which services carry your applications (EC2, EKS, ECS, Lambda, RDS) and whether Datadog is already in use. We can quote the licences, the set-up and technical support together.
Or directly
+966-11-2180999 [email protected]Tawuniya Towers, North Tower, 7th Floor, King Fahad Highway, Olaya, P.O. Box 56835, Riyadh 11564, Saudi Arabia