AWS Certificate Manager review
A strong AWS-native certificate manager with flexible issuance and deployment options.
Reviewed by iTechGuides Editors · Editorial team · Updated Oct 2026
AWS Certificate Manager provisions, stores, manages, and deploys public and private SSL/TLS certificates for AWS services and customer-managed infrastructure. It suits teams running workloads across services such as Elastic Load Balancing, Amazon CloudFront, API Gateway, Amazon EKS, AWS Elastic Beanstalk, and AWS CloudFormation. ACM also supports imported third-party certificates, ACME-based issuance, exportable public certificates, and private certificates issued through AWS Private CA, giving AWS-focused teams several ways to manage certificate lifecycles.
Pricing is usage-based rather than organized into subscription plans. Public certificates for integrated AWS services cost $0 per certificate and are non-exportable. ACME public certificates cost $1 per domain per month for the first 1,000 FQDNs, $0.50 for the next 3,000 FQDNs, and $0.25 for 4,000+ FQDNs. ACME wildcard domains cost $5 per domain per month for the first 500 and $2.50 per domain per month above 500. Exportable public certificates cost $7 per standard FQDN or $79 per wildcard domain. This structure favors AWS-integrated deployments, while external workloads may require paid exportable certificates.
Operationally, ACM combines managed renewal for eligible Amazon-issued certificates with automatic deployment to integrated AWS services. It supports certificate revocation through the console, CLI, or API, ACME client-driven renewal, certificate key storage, and CloudTrail auditing of certificate use. The key limitation is that renewal and deployment behavior varies by certificate origin and integration: imported and ACME certificates require customer- or client-driven renewal, and exportable certificates are priced separately. Choose ACM when AWS services are central to your environment and AWS integration matters most; consider another certificate manager when your primary need is a broader platform-neutral workflow.
AWS Certificate Manager pros and cons
- Where it wins
- Free public certificates for services integrated with AWS Certificate Manager
- Managed renewal and automatic deployment for eligible AWS-issued certificates
- ACME issuance, imports, exports, revocation, and CloudTrail auditing
- Where it doesn't
- Managed renewal depends on certificate origin and service integration
- Imported and ACME certificates require customer- or client-driven renewal
- Exportable certificates add per-domain or per-wildcard-domain charges
AWS Certificate Manager fact sheet, pricing and score →
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