What leaving AWS actually involves
Leaving means re-declaring, not importing: the API surface becomes functions, long-running pieces become workers, DynamoDB items land in tables, and S3 objects land in buckets. Data moves with plain exports your team runs; there is no migration wizard and this page will not invent one.
Teams usually move one product at a time, keep the AWS account for whatever stays, and delete resources service by service as the KERNSTACK project takes over the traffic.
What you stop operating — and what you give up
You stop operating the glue: per-service IAM, console-driven changes nobody reviewed, and a bill assembled from dozens of meters. Reviews become one plan diff against stack.json, and agents can draft changes in a sandbox because the project is one graph instead of five consoles.
- Given up honestly: exotic AWS services, regions outside Europe, and the AWS compliance catalogue
- Kept: the architecture you designed — re-declared once, in one file, in one zone
See also our detailed KERNSTACK vs AWS comparison and the Software Lifecycle Cloud architecture pillar.
Why teams switch from AWS to KERNSTACK
| Dimension | AWS | KERNSTACK (Software Lifecycle Cloud) |
|---|---|---|
| Unit of change | Separate services, each with its own console, API, and IAM | One project declared in stack.json |
| Compute | Lambda for handlers; EC2, ECS, or EKS when processes get long | Functions for handlers, container workers for long processes |
| Data and search | DynamoDB, RDS, S3, and OpenSearch wired together by hand | Tables, buckets, and search indexes in the same project graph |
| Bill | Dozens of per-service meters and pricing pages | One credit balance; compute at 0.01 credits per GiB-second |
| Operator | A US hyperscaler; a region is picked per service | Our own bare metal in Europe; one zone per project |
| Idle cost | Depends on each service; provisioned pieces bill around the clock | No compute charge while idle; storage at 0.04 credits per GB-hour |
Frequently asked questions
Yes. Declare the KERNSTACK project beside the AWS build, move data with ordinary exports, and shift routes as pieces land. Nothing forces a big-bang cutover, and the AWS side keeps running until you turn it off.
Keep that part on AWS. KERNSTACK replaces the common backend pieces; a specialised AWS service can stay where it is and be called over the network. The honest boundary is the feature list, not a sales claim.
In the project zone in Europe, on bare metal we operate ourselves — not in a hyperscaler region rented underneath. The zone is a property of the project, so staging and production answer the residency question the same way.
Related capabilities, architectures, and comparisons
Ship your stack on the Software Lifecycle Cloud.
Closed preview on dedicated European infrastructure. Bring a repository or start from a blueprint.