AWS Certificate Manager Reviews

My main use case for AWS Certificate Manager involves using it with Elastic Cloud balancing and CloudFront to ensure integration and that the lifecycle of certificates is well managed, with my primary use case being the automated provisioning and management of SSL/TLS certificates at scale.

In a recent project, I architected a highly scalable e-commerce platform using AWS services, with AWS Certificate Manager being highly instrumental in ensuring that we leverage it for automatic deployments with elastic load balancing to secure traffic between the clients and application, which was also fundamental to maintaining a strong security posture with our scaling operations.

AWS Certificate Manager eliminates the operational overhead associated with manual certificate lifecycles, so we had continuous security and compliance.

AWS Certificate Manager has impacted my organization positively in many different ways, significantly improving our security posture, operational efficiency, and critical risk mitigation while streamlining our security compliance and preventing costly downtime, especially due to the automated certificate renewal that eliminated our manual processes, significantly reducing our engineering workload and accelerating deployment cycles.

We used to manage our various certificates with a website subscription, but with AWS Certificate Manager, we no longer needed to spend so much money on that, delivering what I would call a near-zero reduction in expiration-related downtime incidents, meaning we never had issues with expired certificates or licenses, thus significantly reducing costs and improving our system reliability.

The best features AWS Certificate Manager offers include many robust features, with one that I find essentially useful being the ability to go beyond traditional SSL or TLS by providing seamless integration for scalable microservices architecture and robust multi-domain management for complex environments. I have used it for maintaining a strong security posture while having very minimal operational overhead, helping with our scalable architecture and simplifying securing inter-service communication via mutual TLS, integrating very directly with our various AWS services such as API Gateway, ALBs, and EKS for automated provisioning and renewal.

AWS Certificate Manager has helped my team and projects significantly through seamless integration on multi-domain management, solving the critical challenge of configuration sprawl and manual renewal overhead by enabling a scalable and compliant system that minimizes the operational friction associated with security, particularly through its integration with elastic load balancing and CloudFront, preventing configuration drifts especially within our distributed architecture.

There is always room for improvement for every product and service, and one aspect I can identify is the need for enhanced automation, especially for complex enterprise-scale renewal workflows, along with the need to expand integration capabilities for hybrid cloud environments, which is crucial for AWS Certificate Manager.

The user interface of AWS Certificate Manager can definitely be designed to cater to complex integration capabilities, especially for hybrid cloud environments, making it easier for both senior and junior engineers to work easily. A modernized UI would streamline certificate lifecycle management along with clearer documentation, which is crucial for complex deployments and troubleshooting.

I have been using AWS Certificate Manager for the past eight years, so it has been a long foray around optimizing workflows and ensuring a robust security posture.

AWS Certificate Manager is stable, and it has been working very efficiently.

In terms of scalability, AWS Certificate Manager allows us to scale based on the demand for the day, and it has been really great with automated renewal and management at scale.

Customer support has been very efficient with AWS, as we are able to get support whenever we need it. AWS has been great with customer service and their robust support system has helped a lot with integrating into our overall business strategy.

On a scale of one to ten for customer support, I would rate it nine out of ten, as it has been very efficient with implementing scalable frameworks while accommodating needs without compromising quality.

Before integrating with AWS Certificate Manager, we used some other OpenSSL and third-party commercial CAs, with the need for operational efficiency, scalability, and risk mitigation being the reasons for switching, which AWS Certificate Manager helps significantly with.

I have seen a return on investment with AWS Certificate Manager, as it saves us a lot of costs because we no longer need to subscribe to manage our certificates through a third party, leading to great operational efficiency and scalability benefits along with drastic cost savings due to the free certificates.

My experience with AWS Certificate Manager regarding pricing, setup cost, and licensing has been seamless, as the pricing has been quite transparent. Since public SSL and TLS certificates are free when deployed to AWS services, it significantly reduced our overall cost, while the setup cost is close to zero due to most of the setup being automated, with licensing being basically integrated and eliminating complex purchasing negotiations, making it a fantastic experience.

Before choosing AWS Certificate Manager, we evaluated other options, as we were looking for tools that would efficiently provide us with scalability, operational efficiency, and risk mitigation, along with seamless integration especially with cloud services. After all our checks, AWS Certificate Manager made it to the top, which is why we went for it.

On a scale of one to ten, I rate AWS Certificate Manager at eight, as it has been wonderful using it, and while I see room for improvement, if those improvements are made, I believe it could easily reach a ten.

Regarding AWS Certificate Manager's governance and security capabilities, the tool has been great and I believe it has a robust certificate management system.

As for AWS Certificate Manager's accuracy and reliability of output, the output has been great, though I personally prefer to verify and ensure that the output is actually in conformity with our production.

In terms of deployment, I have worked on various projects where some are in the public cloud with AWS and Azure, while others are hybrid, keeping some parts in the public cloud and some on-premises, and for some projects, it is actually private cloud, depending on the usage and the customer's preference.

I primarily use AWS for AWS Certificate Manager, making it largely AWS.

For those looking into using AWS Certificate Manager, my advice is that it is great to leverage AWS Certificate Manager for tight integration with AWS services, being a great product for automated renewal and streamlined security management, with successful implementation depending on a strategic approach, including having a clear certificate policy from the outset to distinguish between public and private certificate needs for compliance and optimized costs.

Hybrid Cloud

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

The use case for AWS Certificate Manager is primarily to manage SSL/TLS certificates for our applications.

The renewal function and automated certificate renewal are very helpful for our operations.

AWS Certificate Manager provides central control of certificate lifecycle management, which helps to improve security.

It streamlines the process and reduces human error.

I use ACM Private Certificate Authority for additional security measures.

I see benefits of using AWS Certificate Manager in integration with AWS for secure data transmission.

I see a positive impact in managing SSL and TLS certificates, which simplifies compliance and reduces risk.

Better reporting features would be beneficial.

I have been using this product for about five years.

I would rate it 9 points for stability.

I would give 9 points for scalability.

I rate the tech support 10 out of 10 for this product.

Positive

In terms of installation, AWS Certificate Manager is easy. I conduct it through Terraform, and I have the solution on the public cloud. That's my deployment model, and I've purchased the solution through AWS Marketplace.

I see ROI from AWS Certificate Manager through time savings and money-saving in managing certificates.

I estimate approximately 15 to 20% savings.

AWS Certificate Manager is expensive similar to other products in the AWS stack, but the value outweighs the cost.

Comparing AWS Certificate Manager with other products from Microsoft or other vendors, I find it superior in terms of ease of use and integration.

The product mentioned is AWS Trusted Advisor.

I use CloudFormation, GuardDuty, and Elastic alongside AWS Certificate Manager.

I have rated AWS Certificate Manager a 9 out of 10.

Public Cloud

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

I use AWS Certificate Manager primarily for managing SSL certificates. This includes issuing certificates for domains hosted in different environments and integrating them with Elastic Load Balancer and EC2 instances.

AWS Certificate Manager facilitates secure data transfer across websites by managing SSL certificates, which include automating renewals and ensuring global validation of certificates.

The most valuable features of AWS Certificate Manager include its ability to efficiently manage SSL certificates, its automated renewals, and the provision of secure, globally validated certificates. 

Additionally, it offers encryption with specific algorithms for better management.

There is room for improvement in AWS Certificate Manager with more customization options for the certificate bits. Currently, there is no option to customize beyond the default settings, and it would be beneficial to have the ability to customize certificates to fit specific requirements.

I have been working with AWS Certificate Manager for over two years.

The stability of AWS Certificate Manager is excellent; I have not experienced any outages or downtimes. Once a certificate is issued, there is no need to worry about renewal or payment issues.

AWS Certificate Manager's scalability is top-notch, supporting our needs across different client requirements and ensuring secure, global validation of certificates.

The technical support for AWS Certificate Manager is very good. They have been helpful, providing supportive assistance whenever needed, and I would rate them between nine to ten out of ten.

Positive

The initial setup of AWS Certificate Manager is quite easy and I would rate it a ten out of ten. I have not faced any issues during the setup.

There is essentially no cost associated with AWS Certificate Manager, as it does not charge for the certificates issued. I would rate the pricing as one, which reflects the lowest cost.

I advise new users to utilize AWS Certificate Manager for its ease of management and implementation of SSL certificates. It is a very good solution.

I'd rate the solution ten out of ten.

Public Cloud

The primary use case is to provision and deploy public and private SSL certificates, which can be AWS services like web certificates for web application security, or connectivity to IoT devices. It helps with alerts when SSLs or TLS certificates are expiring and can be used to auto renew or auto provision certain certificates.

It's not necessarily something you can quantify, however, it just means that if it's working correctly, it's business as usual.

The most valuable features are definitely the alerts. AWS Certificate Manager provides notifications to alert users before certificates expire.

Maybe more integration with third-party certificate authorities would be useful. That way users can request certificates directly without having to go through multiple steps.

I've probably been using it for seven years.

It's stable and rated as ten out of ten. There is no instability, and it ensures that business can continue uninterrupted.

I've never reached the highest level of scalability. That said, I've never had an issue with it. We have dealt with hundreds of domains, so it probably has the highest possible scalability.

I'm rating the customer service as ten out of ten because I've never really had to use AWS premium support for AWS Certificate Manager. It's pretty straightforward.

Positive

The initial setup was pretty easy, and I would rate it about nine out of ten. There were no challenges because of my experience with cybersecurity.

AWS Certificate Manager is affordable. The cost depends on how many domains each customer has. There is a cost for each new certificate, but it is minimal.

Make sure new users understand SSL and TLS before trying to implement AWS Certificate Manager. If they don't understand how the certificates secure the network, it would be problematic.

I'd rate the solution ten out of ten.

Public Cloud

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Whenever there is a need for an application layer to use the HTTPS protocol, there is a need to have a certificate, specifically an SSL Certificate. AWS Certificate Manager can generate this certificate, but it must be used within AWS infrastructure. The solution is utilized either with a load balancer, CDN, which refers to AWS CloudFront, or directly on an EC2 instance.

It is easy to generate, easy to use, easy to integrate, and very cost-effective.

One potential improvement could be enabling the extraction of the certificate as a file to be used outside of AWS, even with an additional charge.

I have been using the solution for not less than four years, but I'm not pretty sure about the exact date.

The stability is very high, rated ten out of ten. It is stable to the maximum, and I haven't faced nor heard of any issues with certificate availability.

The solution is highly scalable, rated ten out of ten. There's no limit to the number of certificates you can request, making it scalable to the maximum.

I have not requested customer service or support, nor have I heard of anyone needing to, which indicates the service is perfect. Thus, I would rate the support a ten out of ten.

Positive

The initial setup is straightforward and rated ten out of ten. You request a certificate from AWS, and it usually doesn't take much time for utilization once ownership is validated.

The service is free of charge within AWS, and there are no additional costs for services or capabilities.

Use AWS Certificate Manager whenever you have a website exposed to the internet, and do not hesitate. There are no specific prerequisites or conditions.

I'd rate the solution ten out of ten.

Public Cloud

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

I use AWS Certificate Manager to import and manage the SSL and TLS certificates. We can import the TLS Certificate using AWS Certificate Manager.

The solution has an import dashboard where we can import the certificates or create new certificates.

The AWS Certificate Manager's technical support team is sometimes unavailable.

I have been using AWS Certificate Manager for five years.

I rate AWS Certificate Manager ten out of ten for stability.

I rate the solution ten out of ten for scalability.

The initial setup of the solution was easy.

An experienced person can deploy the solution in five to ten minutes.

We need to apply SSL or TLS configuration for all the applications to secure and host the application on the secured website. Every application needs that certificate to be onboard on top of the application.

The solution gives us a domain name when we create or import a certificate. It will give the domain name only when we click on that certificate. It would be good if we could give a tag to identify that the certificate is related to a website.

We can integrate the solution with load balancers. There will be a link between Route 53 and AWS Certificate Manager. I would recommend AWS Certificate Manager to other users. You can easily import the certificates using AWS Certificate Manager.

Overall, I rate the solution ten out of ten.