# Determine the supported boot modes of an EC2 instance type
<a name="instance-type-boot-mode"></a>

You can determine the supported boot modes of an instance type.

The Amazon EC2 console does not display the supported boot modes of an instance type.

------
#### [ AWS CLI ]

Use the [https://docs.aws.amazon.com/cli/latest/reference/ec2/describe-instance-types.html](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/cli/latest/reference/ec2/describe-instance-types.html) command to determine the supported boot modes of an instance type. The `--query` parameter filters the output to return only the supported boot modes.

The following example shows that the specified instance type supports both UEFI and Legacy BIOS boot modes.

```
aws ec2 describe-instance-types \
    --instance-types m5.2xlarge \
    --query "InstanceTypes[*].SupportedBootModes"
```

The following is example output.

```
[
    [
        "legacy-bios",
        "uefi"
    ]
]
```

The following example shows that `t2.xlarge` supports only Legacy BIOS.

```
aws ec2 describe-instance-types \
    --instance-types t2.xlarge \
    --query "InstanceTypes[*].SupportedBootModes"
```

The following is example output.

```
[
    [
        "legacy-bios"
    ]
]
```

------
#### [ PowerShell ]

Use the [https://docs.aws.amazon.com/powershell/latest/reference/items/Get-EC2InstanceType.html](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/powershell/latest/reference/items/Get-EC2InstanceType.html) cmdlet to determine the supported boot modes of an instance type.

The following example shows that `m5.2xlarge` supports both UEFI and Legacy BIOS boot modes.

```
Get-EC2InstanceType -InstanceType m5.2xlarge | Format-List InstanceType, SupportedBootModes
```

The following is example output.

```
InstanceType       : m5.2xlarge
SupportedBootModes : {legacy-bios, uefi}
```

The following example shows that `t2.xlarge` supports only Legacy BIOS.

```
Get-EC2InstanceType -InstanceType t2.xlarge | Format-List InstanceType, SupportedBootModes
```

The following is example output.

```
InstanceType       : t2.xlarge
SupportedBootModes : {legacy-bios}
```

------

**To determine the instance types that support UEFI**  
You can determine the instance types that support UEFI. The Amazon EC2 console does not display the UEFI support of an instance type.

------
#### [ AWS CLI ]

The available instance types vary by AWS Region. To see the available instance types that support UEFI in a Region, use the [describe-instance-types](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/cli/latest/reference/ec2/describe-instance-types.html) command. Include the `--filters` parameter to scope the results to the instance types that support UEFI and the `--query` parameter to scope the output to the value of `InstanceType`.

```
aws ec2 describe-instance-types \
    --filters Name=supported-boot-mode,Values=uefi \
    --query "InstanceTypes[*].[InstanceType]" \
    --output text | sort
```

------
#### [ PowerShell ]

The available instance types vary by AWS Region. To see the available instance types that support UEFI in a Region, use the [Get-EC2InstanceType](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/powershell/latest/reference/items/Get-EC2InstanceType.html) cmdlet.

```
Get-EC2InstanceType -Filter @{Name="supported-boot-mode"; Values="uefi"} |
	Sort-Object @{E={$_.ProcessorInfo.SupportedArchitectures}}, InstanceType |
	Format-Table InstanceType, SupportedBootModes, `
      @{Name="SupportedArchitectures"; E={$_.ProcessorInfo.SupportedArchitectures}}
```

------

**To determine the instance types that support UEFI Secure Boot and persist non-volatile variables**  
Bare metal instances do not support UEFI Secure Boot and non-volatile variables, so these examples exclude them from the output. For information about UEFI Secure Boot, see [UEFI Secure Boot for Amazon EC2 instances](uefi-secure-boot.md).

------
#### [ AWS CLI ]

Use the [describe-instance-types](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/cli/latest/reference/ec2/describe-instance-types.html) command, and exclude the bare metal instances from the output.

```
aws ec2 describe-instance-types \
    --filters Name=supported-boot-mode,Values=uefi Name=bare-metal,Values=false \
    --query "InstanceTypes[*].[InstanceType]" \
    --output text | sort
```

------
#### [ PowerShell ]

Use the [Get-EC2InstanceType](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/powershell/latest/reference/items/Get-EC2InstanceType.html) cmdlet, and exclude the bare metal instances from the output.

```
Get-EC2InstanceType -Filter `
      @{Name="supported-boot-mode"; Values="uefi"}, `
      @{Name="bare-metal"; Values="false"} |
	Sort-Object @{E={$_.ProcessorInfo.SupportedArchitectures}}, InstanceType |
	Format-Table InstanceType, SupportedBootModes, `
      @{Name="SupportedArchitectures"; E={$_.ProcessorInfo.SupportedArchitectures}}
```

------