Example 1: To start a new task

The following start-task example starts a task using the latest revision of the sleep360 task definition on the specified container instance in the default cluster.

aws ecs start-task \
    --task-definition sleep360 \
    --container-instances 765936fadbdd46b5991a4bd70c2a43d4

Output:

{
    "tasks": [
        {
            "taskArn": "arn:aws:ecs:us-west-2:123456789012:task/default/666fdccc2e2d4b6894dd422f4eeee8f8",
            "clusterArn": "arn:aws:ecs:us-west-2:123456789012:cluster/default",
            "taskDefinitionArn": "arn:aws:ecs:us-west-2:123456789012:task-definition/sleep360:3",
            "containerInstanceArn": "arn:aws:ecs:us-west-2:123456789012:container-instance/default/765936fadbdd46b5991a4bd70c2a43d4",
            "overrides": {
                "containerOverrides": [
                    {
                        "name": "sleep"
                    }
                ]
            },
            "lastStatus": "PENDING",
            "desiredStatus": "RUNNING",
            "cpu": "128",
            "memory": "128",
            "containers": [
                {
                    "containerArn": "arn:aws:ecs:us-west-2:123456789012:container/75f11ed4-8a3d-4f26-a33b-ad1db9e02d41",
                    "taskArn": "arn:aws:ecs:us-west-2:123456789012:task/default/666fdccc2e2d4b6894dd422f4eeee8f8",
                    "name": "sleep",
                    "lastStatus": "PENDING",
                    "networkInterfaces": [],
                    "cpu": "10",
                    "memory": "10"
                }
            ],
            "version": 1,
            "createdAt": 1563421494.186,
            "group": "family:sleep360",
            "launchType": "EC2",
            "attachments": [],
            "tags": []
        }
    ],
    "failures": []
}

For more information, see Schedule your containers on Amazon ECS in the Amazon ECS Developer Guide.

Example 2: To configure an Amazon EBS volume at task start

The following start-task example configures an encrypted Amazon EBS volume for a task on the specified container instance. You must have an Amazon ECS infrastructure role configured with the AmazonECSInfrastructureRolePolicyForVolumes managed policy attached. You must specify a task definition with the same volume name as in the start-task request. This example uses the --cli-input-json option and a JSON input file called ebs.json with the following content.

aws ecs start-task \
    --cli-input-json file://ebs.json \
    --container-instances 765936fadbdd46b5991a4bd70c2a43d4

Contents of ebs.json:

{
   "cluster": "default",
   "taskDefinition": "mytaskdef",
   "networkConfiguration":{
        "awsvpcConfiguration":{
            "assignPublicIp": "ENABLED",
            "securityGroups": ["sg-12344321"],
            "subnets":["subnet-12344321"]
        }
    },
   "volumeConfigurations": [
        {
            "name": "myEBSVolume",
            "managedEBSVolume": {
                "volumeType": "gp3",
                "sizeInGiB": 100,
                "roleArn":"arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/ecsInfrastructureRole",
                "encrypted": true,
                "kmsKeyId": "arn:aws:kms:region:123456789012:key/1234abcd-12ab-34cd-56ef-1234567890ab"
            }
        }
    ]
}

Output:

{
    "tasks": [
        {
            "attachments": [
                {
                    "id": "aea29489-9dcd-49f1-8164-4d91566e1113",
                    "type": "ElasticNetworkInterface",
                    "status": "PRECREATED",
                    "details": [
                        {
                            "name": "subnetId",
                            "value": "subnet-12344321"
                        }
                    ]
                },
                {
                    "id": "f29e1222-9a1e-410f-b499-a12a7cd6d42e",
                    "type": "AmazonElasticBlockStorage",
                    "status": "CREATED",
                    "details": [
                        {
                            "name": "roleArn",
                            "value": "arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/ecsInfrastructureRole"
                        },
                        {
                            "name": "volumeName",
                            "value": "myEBSVolume"
                        },
                        {
                            "name": "deleteOnTermination",
                            "value": "true"
                        }
                    ]
                }
            ],
            "attributes": [
                {
                    "name": "ecs.cpu-architecture",
                    "value": "arm64"
                }
            ],
            "availabilityZone": "us-west-2c",
            "clusterArn": "arn:aws:ecs:us-west-2:123456789012:cluster/default",
            "containerInstanceArn": "arn:aws:ecs:us-west-2:123456789012:container-instance/default/765936fadbdd46b5991a4bd70c2a43d4",
            "containers": [
                {
                    "containerArn": "arn:aws:ecs:us-west-2:123456789012:container/default/bb122ace3ed84add92c00a351a03c69e/a4a9ed10-51c7-4567-9653-50e71b94f867",
                    "taskArn": "arn:aws:ecs:us-west-2:123456789012:task/default/bb122ace3ed84add92c00a351a03c69e",
                    "name": "container-using-ebs",
                    "image": "amazonlinux:2",
                    "lastStatus": "PENDING",
                    "networkInterfaces": [],
                    "cpu": "0"
                }
            ],
            "cpu": "1024",
            "createdAt": "2025-01-23T14:51:05.191000-06:00",
            "desiredStatus": "RUNNING",
            "enableExecuteCommand": false,
            "group": "family:mytaskdef",
            "lastStatus": "PROVISIONING",
            "launchType": "EC2",
            "memory": "3072",
            "overrides": {
                "containerOverrides": [
                    {
                        "name": "container-using-ebs"
                    }
                ],
                "inferenceAcceleratorOverrides": []
            },
             "tags": [],
            "taskArn": "arn:aws:ecs:us-west-2:123456789012:task/default/bb122ace3ed84add92c00a351a03c69e",
            "taskDefinitionArn": "arn:aws:ecs:us-west-2:123456789012:task-definition/mytaskdef:4",
            "version": 1
        }
    ],
    "failures": []
}

For more information, see Use Amazon EBS volumes with Amazon ECS in the Amazon ECS Developer Guide.