How to Enable Nested Virtualization on AWS M8id Instances

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If you’re wondering whether nested virtualization is supported on your instance, the answer is yes, but you’ll need to enable it yourself. While your hardware may support it, this feature isn’t turned on by default. Here’s how you can enable nested virtualization when launching a new instance:

Use the command line to create your instance and include the parameter to enable nested virtualization. For example:

aws ec2 run-instances \
–image-id ami-1234566 \
–instance-type m8id.4xlarge \
–cpu-options “NestedVirtualization=enabled”

When you go through the launch process in the AWS Console, you’ll also find an option to set CPU features in the Advanced Details section. Make sure to select or enable nested virtualization there.

Many people assume nested virtualization isn’t supported on all instances because the documentation often groups different instance variants under broader families like M8i. However, the tech behind these instances—based on the Nitro Hypervisor and hardware capabilities like VMCS Shadowing and Intel TDX—means there’s no reason why the “d” variants, such as M8id, can’t support nested virtualization. The main difference is that some instances have local NVMe storage, but the core compute fabric remains the same.

So, even if it’s not enabled by default, it’s possible to set up nested virtualization on your M8id instance with just a few steps during launch.