# Connect Lightsail resources to AWS services using VPC peering
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With Amazon Lightsail, you can connect to AWS resources, such as an Amazon RDS database, through virtual private cloud (VPC) peering. A VPC is a virtual network dedicated to your AWS account. Everything you create inside Lightsail is inside a VPC, and you can connect your Lightsail VPC to an Amazon VPC.

Some AWS resources, such as Amazon S3, Amazon CloudFront, and Amazon DynamoDB don't require that you enable VPC peering.

**Note**  
To enable VPC peering in Lightsail, you must have a default VPC in your AWS Region. The peering relationship will be between your resources in Lightsail and those in your default VPC for the Region you enable VPC peering for. If you don’t have a default Amazon VPC, you can create one. For more information, see [Default VPCs](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/vpc/latest/userguide/default-vpc.html) and [Create a Default VPC ](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/vpc/latest/userguide/work-with-default-vpc.html#create-default-vpc) in the *Amazon VPC User Guide*.  
Since AWS Regions are isolated from one another, a VPC is also isolated in the region where you created it. You will need to enable VPC peering in each AWS Region where you have Lightsail resources that you want to connect your other resources to.

Once you have a default Amazon VPC, follow these instructions to peer your Lightsail VPC with your Amazon VPC.

1. In the [Lightsail console](https://lightsail.aws.amazon.com/), choose your **username** on the top navigation menu. 

1. Choose **Account** from the drop-down.

1. Choose the **Advanced** tab.

1. Toggle the **status** next to the AWS Region where you want to enable VPC peering.  
![\[Enable VPC peering on the Account page\]](http://docs.aws.amazon.com/lightsail/latest/userguide/images/amazon-lightsail-enable-vpc-peering.png)

   If the peering connection fails, try to enable VPC peering again. If it doesn't work, contact [AWS Support](https://console.aws.amazon.com/support/home/).

   A peering connection is created in your AWS account if the peering request is successful. Go to the [Amazon VPC Dashboard](https://console.aws.amazon.com/vpc/home#PeeringConnections) and choose **Peering Connections** in the navigation pane to view the peering connection that is created.

   For more information about Amazon VPC, see [VPC and Subnets](http://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonVPC/latest/UserGuide/how-it-works.html#how-it-works-subnet) in the *Amazon VPC User Guide*.

## Allow communication with other AWS services
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Once VPC peering has been enabled, you must ensure that your resources in the other AWS services you want to connect to accept inbound traffic from your Lightsail resources. If you want resources from other AWS services to connect to your Lightsail instances, you can add firewall rules to allow the required inbound traffic. For more information, see [Add firewall rules to Lightsail instances](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/lightsail/latest/userguide/amazon-lightsail-editing-firewall-rules.html).

The steps you might take will depend on the service and types of traffic you are working with. For an example of the steps you might take to connect a Lightsail instance to an Amazon RDS database, see the [Amazon Lightsail Database Tips and Tricks](https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/compute/amazon-lightsail-database-tips-and-tricks/) AWS blog post. For more information on the services you can integrate with Lightsail using VPC peering, see [Integrate Lightsail with other AWS services with VPC peering](using-lightsail-with-other-aws-services.md).